An Ancient Magic
by Bluecrow213
Summary: There is more than one kind of magic. One is the kind we all know, practiced in Britain's hidden magical world, but there is another kind, more ancient perhaps, and certainly much rarer. Those possessing it need special guidance, but with good friends, they can achieve just as much as any other student at Hogwarts. Marauders Era. Rated M for future content.
1. Magic, and Other Subjects

The Sorting Hat shouted, "Slytherin!" and Severus almost ran to take his place at the table. One of the oldest boys spoke to him, tone welcoming, and Severus nodded, barely taking in the words. His head was reeling with the feeling of triumph: he was actually here, at Hogwarts, in Slytherin House as he had so desperately hoped. He watched as the last few First Years were sorted, most going to either Ravenclaw or Hufflepuff. Finally, one child was left, a girl, very slight and looking absurdly young to be at Hogwarts, apparently no more than nine or ten.

"Solstice Flidae," called Professor McGonagall, and the girl went and took her place on the stool.

The Sorting Hat slipped down, partly covering her eyes, and she said something, although her words were heard by no-one but the Hat itself. For a couple of minutes, there was silence; there almost seemed to be an air of bafflement about the Hat's posture. Then Solstice spoke again, and in a doubtful voice, the Hat said, "Gryffindor...?" Solstice jumped off the stool, and trotted over to the Gryffindor table, scrambling up onto the bench next to Lily.

Professor Dumbledore rose from his place at the High Table, and the Great Hall fell silent. "Welcome to another year at Hogwarts," he began.

Only half-listening, Severus looked over at the distant Gryffindor table, trying to catch Lily's eye, but she was paying attention to Professor Dumbledore, her expression rapt. He watched her as the speech continued, then, as Dumbledore moved back to his chair, the empty dishes on the table were suddenly filled with food. To a child accustomed to meals that were erratic at best, and frequently completely absent, the sight was overwhelming. Severus piled food onto his plate, and began to eat, shoveling it into his mouth with both hands, oblivious to the sudden hush around him.

"You disgusting little pig!" Severus looked up, startled, to find Lucius Malfoy, the 7th year prefect who had spoken to him when he took his place at the Slytherin table, glaring at him. "I don't know what gutter you were dragged up in," Lucius continued, "but here at Hogwarts we expect table manners."

Severus tried to swallow his mouthful, his throat suddenly tight, as if a lump of something was stuck in it. Around him, the other First Year Slytherins snickered. Years of experience had made Severus reasonably adept at ducking his father's heavy hand, but shame dulled his reflexes, and he didn't react as Lucius suddenly leaned over, grabbed his hair, and slammed his face down on his plate. Pain exploded through his nose, and the howl of laughter from his tablemates was momentarily drowned by a loud ringing in his ears. Choking, he lifted his head, lumps of mashed potato falling from his face. The noise was attracting attention from the other tables, and Severus caught sight of those Gryffindor boys, the ones who had jeered on the train, laughing at him. Next to them, Lily was pressing her lips together, and from that distance it looked to Severus as if she was trying not to laugh.

To his horror, he felt tears pricking his eyes. If he cried now, in front of everyone, on his first day... he ducked his head, his dirty black hair falling in curtains, covering his face. He mustn't cry, he mustn't...

Gradually students started whispering to each other, casting sneering glances at Severus. Malfoy, meanwhile, had returned to his conversation with a fellow prefect as if nothing had happened. As the moment passed Severus gulped hard, slowly regaining control then reached for a table napkin and wiped the food from his face. Mortified at having forgotten his table manners like that, he picked up the knife and fork beside his plate. His hands were shaking, and he fumbled with the cutlery at first, but after a couple of tries he managed to get some food into his mouth.

Looking up across the room, he noticed the last child to be sorted – Solstice, he thought her name had been – was staring at the Slytherin table, but not at him. Her eyes were on Malfoy, and there was an expression on her face that reminded Severus of a cat he had once seen, defending her litter of kittens from a large, angry dog. He finally made eye contact with Lily. She looked horrified, and he quickly dropped his gaze back to his plate, concentrating on getting through the rest of the meal.

Magic, it seemed, was not the only subject considered important at Hogwarts.

* * *

As the students filed out of the Great Hall, Lily caught up with Severus. "What happened?" she hissed in a whisper.

Not wanting to think about it, Severus shook his head, but a scornful voice said, "Well go on, tell her!" They both looked up at Malfoy, who was grinning unpleasantly. "Tell your... little friend... about your disgusting performance at supper." Severus glanced at Lily, but said nothing. Leaning closer, Malfoy said menacingly, "Apparently your so-called upbringing also neglected the fact that when a prefect gives you an order, you _obey it_!" He seized Severus by the collar of his robes. "Evidently, it's time you had another lesson in..."

"Leave him alone!" Before either Severus or Malfoy had time to react, Solstice Flidae burst from the crowd of students. In the silence that fell, she shouted, "You big bully!"

For a second or two no-one moved. Then Malfoy spluttered, "You little..." Letting go of Severus, he turned on Solstice and grabbed her shoulder roughly. Instantly her head whipped around, and she sank her teeth into his hand. In the uproar, Malfoy staggered back a couple of steps, clutching the fleshy part at the base of his thumb, blood already running between his fingers. Before anyone else could react, Professor McGonagall strode into their midst.

"What is the meaning of this?" she demanded.

Half a dozen people tried to tell her at once, but Malfoy's voice rose above them as he spat, "She bit me!"

Professor McGonagall stared at Malfoy, then Solstice, in disbelief. "Is this true?" she demanded.

"Yes." Solstice's tone implied that she was stating the very obvious.

Professor McGonagall was speechless for a moment, then drawing herself up to full height, she pointed at the staircase. "My office, now!" As Solstice turned and headed in the direction indicated, Professor McGonagall added, "You too, Mr. Malfoy."

* * *

"I really don't know, Headmaster, neither of them would enlighten me." Professor McGonagall sounded exasperated as she faced Dumbledore in his office later that evening. "All Solstice would say was that Malfoy should apologize. And _he_ swore it was an unprovoked attack." She paused, considering. "I can't help wondering if it's wise to have such a child at Hogwarts, on top of everything else – goodness knows, it's going to be enough of a challenge having the Lupin boy changing into a werewolf every full moon. Taking on a child who has Elemental magic is just asking for trouble – they are known for their impulsiveness! And both in the same house, in the same year!"

"An Elemental witch has as much right to an education as any other child. Elemental magic is poorly understood – there are so few born with it - but there is no doubt that a child who possesses it must be taught control." He smiled. "Not to mention tact!"

Professor McGonagall relaxed enough to return the smile. Thoughtfully, she said, "You know, Headmaster, I could swear the whole thing had something to do with that grubby black-haired Slytherin First Year, but..."

"Ah yes, young Severus. He is another child who, I fear, may have trouble fitting in at first."

Professor McGonagall raised an eyebrow. "And why would that be?"

"A thoroughly chaotic home life. His mother was here at Hogwarts some years ago – Eileen Prince."

"Ah, I see. Hardly the maternal type, if I recall. And the father?"

"A muggle, with no sympathy for the magical world. I suspect that Severus's childhood has been less than harmonious." Seeing McGonagall's grim expression, Dumbledore went on, "Such children frequently blossom once they start Hogwarts, Minerva, we've both seen it on many occasions."

McGonagall rose from her chair. "Let us hope that you're right." She turned towards the door. "I must go and round up the stragglers in the Gryffindor corridors. Goodnight, Headmaster."

* * *

**SEVERAL WEEKS LATER**

The other Slytherins had already gone to bed, but Severus was still sitting in the dilapidated armchair in the common room, poring over the chapter set for Charms homework, and making notes in his cramped, untidy handwriting. He'd been at Hogwarts for a few weeks now, and was finding the schoolwork well within his abilities, even discovering a flair for some subjects. Potions, for example, was like fitting together a jigsaw puzzle, putting all the different pieces together just right. And Defense Against the Dark Arts was fascinating; he hadn't realized before just how many possibilities existed, how many different kinds of magic there were.

To his joy, Lily was in some of the same classes with him. True, so were those boys who had mocked him; they just couldn't resist any chance to taunt him. But Lily seemed to find them just as obnoxious as he did. As long as he had her, he really didn't care if he didn't make any other friends – and that was starting to look like a distinct possibility. A number of his classmates, following Malfoy's example, had started criticizing him at every opportunity, telling him to wash his hair, or brush his teeth more often, or generally commenting on his manners. He made an impatient movement with his shoulders. His mum hadn't bothered much with stuff like that, so why should the other kids care? He shrugged again, dismissing them, and resumed scribbling, so absorbed in his work that he didn't even notice that someone else had come into the common room, until...

"Ah, Severus. Just the boy I was looking for."

Severus jumped, recognizing the voice, and looked up. Lucius Malfoy dropped elegantly into the armchair opposite, shaking his long, silver-blonde hair back from his face. He fixed Severus with a stare, his ice-pale eyes boring into him. "I've been watching you," he said lazily. Severus swallowed nervously, wondering what he'd done now. Malfoy continued to stare at him for a minute or two, then said abruptly, "I think you have potential."

Severus gaped at him, mentally thrown off balance. "I do?" he gulped.

"Oh yes. You're a bright boy; good student or so I hear."

"I – er – I mean..."

Malfoy smiled almost indulgently at Severus's confused stammering. "You also seem to be capable of learning from your mistakes. Your table manners, for example, have really improved. Well done."

Severus squirmed slightly at the reminder of that humiliating first evening of term. Still, Malfoy's condescending approval was definitely better than his contempt, and he managed to reply, "Yes, I – I tried."

"Well don't stop trying. Still plenty of room for improvement, you know." Severus nodded uncertainly, and Malfoy glanced at the clock on the wall. "Time you were in bed. Run along." Severus bundled together his books, parchment and quills, but as he stood up, Malfoy added, "One more thing..."

Severus stopped, his heart beating faster with anxiety. He must have done something wrong after all. "Y-yes?"

"Don't forget, you can always come to me if you have any problems. That's what we prefects are here for, after all. Off you go." This was definitely dismissal, and Severus started for the door, clutching his books. On the threshold, he glanced back. Malfoy was staring into the fire, his expression unreadable.

"Goodnight."

Malfoy inclined his head, but did not reply, and Severus hurried away along the hallway leading to his dormitory.

Alone in the common room now, Lucius continued to watch the dying flames. Absently, he rubbed the inside of his left forearm. "Yes, he has potential," he murmured. "We shall see."


	2. A Different Kind of Magic

It was mid-October, but the weather was still almost summerlike. On that particular Sunday, the sky was cloudless, and students were out all over Hogwarts's grounds.

Lily had assumed that she would be able to talk to Severus alone, but it wasn't turning out that way. That irritating Potter boy insisted on following them, along with the entourage he had already acquired; Sirius Black, lithe, dark-haired and precocious; Peter Pettigrew, chubby and red-faced from exertion, and that quiet, skinny boy, Remus Lupin, who looked pale and tired at the best of times, but today appeared to have been in a fight, with his face scratched and puffy, and a spectacular black eye.

If that wasn't bad enough, she thought, it appeared that Severus had a follower of his own. Solstice, who had bitten that prefect on the first night of term seemed to have decided that Severus needed a bodyguard, and that she was it! It would have been comical if it wasn't so annoying to have her tagging along at every opportunity, even though she never actually said much. It had turned out that, despite her diminutive appearance, she really was eleven like the rest of them, but apart from that, she was definitely different. There were several classes she attended, but seemed unable to participate in the practical side, like Charms and Transfiguration; and as far as Lily knew, she didn't even have a wand. She was in Lily's dormitory, and one night Lily had asked her about these differences. Solstice had shrugged and said simply,

"My magic is different from yours."

The ill-matched group was approaching the lake, Potter and his friends clowning and teasing, and Solstice at a slight distance, glowering when the boys taunted Severus.

Lily was feeling cross that the promising day seemed to have been spoiled, when the situation got even worse. Three Seventh Years strolled into view, and one of them was Lucius Malfoy. After what had happened on the first night, Lily had been surprised to discover that Severus seemed to regard the prefect with awe, almost as if Malfoy was an older brother whose approval he craved. She'd heard Malfoy ticking Severus off quite harshly on several occasions, but at other times he showed a patronizing interest.

Today was evidently one of the former occasions.

Blocking the path of the First Years, he surveyed the seven children, his upper lip curling derisively. "Severus – what is _this?_" From his tone, he might have been referring to a particularly loathsome insect. "It's bad enough you spend so much time with Gryffindors, but really – a blood traitor, a mudblood, and a..." His gaze fell on Solstice. "Well, I don't think they've quite worked out yet just exactly what you are," he sneered.

Solstice took a step forward. "Well I bet it didn't take them long to figure out that you're a Winter Sprite!" Lucius froze, a look of total outrage on his pale face.

Not understanding why the term Solstice had used was so offensive, James glanced at Sirius, who seemed caught between horror and outright giggles. At James's questioning glance, he muttered, "Winter Sprites are a myth – they have white hair, but the thing is, they're supposed to – well - like other boys." James continued to frown, puzzled, and Sirius added, "You know – they – they really like other boys!" James finally caught on, his eyes widening.

Luckily, Sirius's explanation went unnoticed by Malfoy, who now appeared to be shaking with anger. "Little bitch!" he hissed, seizing the front of Solstice's robes, and almost jerking her off her feet.

The result was, in hindsight, rather predictable: Solstice bit down as hard as she could on Malfoy's wrist. Malfoy let go instantly, took a half-step backwards, and with all his strength, backhanded Solstice across the face. The voices of the other First Years rose in an outcry, and James and Remus ran to pick up the girl. The blow itself, and the force with which she had hit the ground should have stunned Solstice, if not knocked her out completely, but she was back on her feet before her classmates reached her.

A livid red weal was rising on the left side of her face, but the rest of her skin had gone deathly white. Her blazing eyes locked on to Malfoy's and he realized with shock that he was literally unable to look away. Struggling to break from her gaze, he didn't see, as the others did, that Solstice had extended her left hand towards him, fingers splayed and curving back. There was a violent sizzling noise, and a brilliant flash of light seemed to travel down from the sky, through Solstice's fingers, and exploded at Malfoy's feet. There was a roar of thunder, followed by a second flash of lightning, and Malfoy screamed and put his hands to his eyes. The acrid smell of burning hair filled the air, but before the flames could do more than singe Malfoy's neck, rain started to fall heavily, extinguishing them.

Malfoy fell to his knees, covering his face, as black clouds, tinged with green, boiled in the sky above the lake; the next crack of thunder made their ears ring. Solstice took another step towards Malfoy, her hand still outstretched, but before she could do anything else, Sirius hurled himself bodily at her, knocked her flat, and pinned her face-down by her shoulders.

The sudden appearance of a thunderstorm out of a clear blue sky, not surprisingly attracted the attention of everyone in the grounds, and it wasn't long before several teachers arrived at the scene, with Professor McGonagall leading the pack. The first thing she saw was Sirius still pinning Solstice to the ground. One look from McGonagall made Sirius release her and pull her to her feet. The damage to her face was worse than it had first looked. The weal was already darkening to a huge bruise that extended over her left eye, and both her eyes were beginning to swell. A trickle of blood ran from the corner of her mouth, and a larger one from her nose.

Professor McGonagall would have attended to the girl at once, unaware that she wasn't the only one hurt, but one of the Seventh Years bending over Malfoy cried out in a scared voice, "Professor, he's burnt!"

Professor McGonagall brushed aside the two boys, and after a moment persuaded Malfoy to take his hands away from his face. What she saw made her exclaim, "He needs to go to the hospital wing immediately!"

As Malfoy's friends pulled him to his feet, McGonagall said to Solstice, "You need to go too. No..." as the other First Years began to babble. "I will hear what happened later! Right now, Mr Malfoy needs immediate treatment." Taking Solstice by the hand, she followed briskly after the older boys who were half-carrying Malfoy towards the castle. 

* * *

"So it appears that there was provocation on both sides," Professor Dumbledore said thoughtfully to Professors McGonagall and Slughorn, after the First and Seventh years who had witnessed the incident had been dismissed.

McGonagall compressed her lips. "I find it hard to believe that a Seventh Year – and a Prefect at that – could strike a child so much younger and smaller than himself."

"Whilst I agree with you on that point, Professor..." Professor Dumbledore began, but Professor Slughorn interrupted,

"The girl's response was out of all proportion! Lucius could have been blinded, if not killed..."

"And that is exactly what I was afraid of at the start of term!" Professor McGonagall exclaimed. "A child of her age, capable of drawing down lightning with her bare hands, and with so little self-control... today's events prove, Headmaster, just how dangerous it is to have her here at Hogwarts."

"Yet she must remain here so that she can be taught that necessary control. Fortunately, I have just found a teacher willing to come to Hogwarts to focus on teaching Solstice according to her special requirements. Hopefully she will prove amenable to such lessons."

"From all I've seen, she is co-operative in class, and seems eager to learn. It's just when she loses her temper... Just who is it that's coming to teach her?"

"Do you remember Jack Greenwood, Minerva? He would have been a student at Hogwarts for several years after you started to teach here."

"The name does sound somewhat familiar..."

"His mother was an Elemental, and Jack inherited some of her abilities – along with his father's more usual magic. The important thing is that he understands the particular challenges that an Elemental faces. He will be here by the end of the week, and I think it best if he starts to teach Solstice as soon as possible. Minerva, I leave it to you to make the necessary adjustments in her timetable. And to decide on a suitable punishment for today's misdeeds."

Dumbledore turned to Professor Slughorn.

"Now, as to Mr Malfoy's actions..."

"But surely, after what happened to him today, you can't expect me to impose any penalties on him!" Professor Slughorn exclaimed.

Professor Dumbledore regarded him steadily. "As Professor McGonagall pointed out, he struck a much younger child. And this is not the first time there have been accusations of bullying against him. It is hardly a good example to have him remain a prefect. I know that prefects are a matter for the head of house, but I urge you to consider the consequences for Slytherin House, if his treatment of Solstice is allowed to go unchecked."

Professor Slughorn stared at Professor Dumbledore, aghast. The Malfoys were a wealthy and influential family. He had counted Lucius as a prize member of his 'Slug Club', and demoting the boy would certainly mean an end to that. Still, he was uncomfortably aware that Professor Dumbledore had a valid point. He sighed. "Very well. I'll see to it – when Lucius is feeling better!"

Professor Dumbledore got up from his desk. "And now, if you would both care to accompany me, I will look in on the patients myself." 

* * *

In the hospital wing, Madam Pomfrey gave them the news they had hoped for.

"He will make a full recovery. I was able to apply the potion in time, and Mr Malfoy's sight will be back to normal in a few days. He's very uncomfortable at the moment, or course, but I'm confident that there won't be any scarring."

"Good news indeed, "Professor Dumbledore replied. "And Solstice?"

"No lasting damage at all, although she'll have quite a headache for a day or so. I'm keeping her here overnight, just to make sure she keeps quiet." 

* * *

Solstice did not return to school until late the next day, but was back at the Gryffindor table at supper. She ate little as her jaw was still sore and swollen, and as soon as the meal was over, went straight up to her dormitory. Lily, going up to bed at her usual time, saw that Solstice was not asleep. She was sitting up, knees drawn to her chest, and her arms clasped around her legs. She was staring out of the open window at the grounds, which were flooded with light from a moon just a few days past full.

"How are you feeling?" Lily asked tentatively, her irritation at Solstice's habit of tagging along having vanished for the moment. She was now rather in awe of the dark-haired girl, after seeing what she was capable of with her "different magic".

Solstice shrugged. "Okay. Wish I could sleep outside though."

"Outside? But - but why? It would be scary in the grounds after dark. All the shadows and noises and stuff."

Solstice glanced sideways at Lily. "What's scary about that? Just trees moving in the wind, and animals hunting. I hate being inside so much." She got off her bed and padded to the window, climbing onto the broad window seat and leaning out in a way that made Lily, who was a bit nervous of heights, feel queasy. Solstice knelt there for a while, oblivious to the other girls coming into the dormitory. Finally she went back to bed, curled up on her side, and closed her eyes.

Some hours later Lily awoke suddenly, feeling thirsty. It must be past midnight, she thought. She got up and went into the bathroom for a drink of water, and it was only on her return that she realized that Solstice's bed was empty. Had she felt ill again, and gone to the hospital wing? Or maybe she was just down in the common room. Her gaze fell on the wardrobe beside Solstice's bed. The door was standing open, and the hook that should have held her cloak was empty.

Lily remembered Solstice talking about wanting to be outside. That must be where she'd gone. Lily glanced nervously at the window. Should she go after Solstice? Her own fear of being outside after dark made her discard this idea almost immediately. Well then, should she tell a teacher? Or a prefect? Would that be sneaking...? She sat down on the edge of her bed, irresolute, but at that moment she heard steps in the hallway outside. Quickly, she got under her quilt, just before the dormitory door opened.

Professor McGonagall came in, leading Solstice who looked sulky. Solstice's feet were bare and dirty, and the hem of her cloak was damp. Professor McGonagall took Solstice's cloak and hung it back in the wardrobe, then watched sternly as Solstice climbed into bed. "I will see you in my office before breakfast, Miss Flidae!"

Solstice didn't reply, just lay down, not bothering to pull the covers over herself, and when Professor McGonagall tried to pull the quilt up around the girl's shoulders, Solstice pushed it off again petulantly, and turned her back to Professor McGonagall. The Professor looked at her, lips set in a straight line. Then her expression softened slightly, and all she said was, "Goodnight, Solstice," before going out and softly closing the door behind her. 

* * *

Malfoy returned to school three days later. As he walked into the Great Hall, a whisper spread through the students already there eating breakfast, but he walked unhurriedly to his accustomed place at the Slytherin table, his head held at high. It was beneath him to pay attention to such vulgar gossiping. The skin on his face was slightly inflamed, in sharp contrast to his normal pallor, and still stung and itched on occasion, but that was fading. And apart from being slightly bloodshot, his eyes were, as Madam Pomfrey had predicted, unharmed. Nonetheless, he was acutely aware that his appearance would cause a great deal of comment.

Until the preceding Sunday, his fine, silver-blonde hair had reached halfway down his back, contrasting splendidly with his dark clothing. But it had been so badly singed that Madam Pomfrey had cropped it to within an inch of his scalp. The only possible consolation was that the shock of seeing him without his trademark hair would distract everyone's attention from the fact that his Prefect badge was also missing.


	3. Meditations on Revenge

Jack Greenwood shouldered his backpack, and walked through the main gate of Hogwarts. It was thirteen years since he'd last been there, but not much had changed. He'd never imagined that he'd return to teach. At the end of Seventh year, all he could think of was traveling, and he'd spent most of the time since graduation on the road, rarely staying more than a few months in any one place.

He paused, looking up at the castle, and wondered if he'd made the right choice; the opportunity was an intriguing one - to teach, one-one-one, a First Year Elemental child who had come uncomfortably close to killing another student with lightning. It seemed that she hadn't known that she had the ability to summon storms.

Jack had had a similar experience when he was ten, though his Elemental powers were much less pronounced, having been passed down from his mother. As an Elemental herself, she'd known what to watch for. He'd been exhibiting signs of latent Elemental powers - along with normal magical tendencies inherited from the father he'd never met - since the age of ten months, when he had literally been able to charm the birds from the trees. Always fascinated by flying things, he'd one day started to call them to his playpen, set in the grass on a fine day.

Other manifestations had followed over the years, until the memorable day during a storm when he'd called the lightning in the same way as he called birds. Only his mother's quick reflexes had prevented him being fried, and after that she'd started to teach him to control his more dangerous abilities. Special lessons at school had refined his control, and he'd learnt much about his gift during his travels. Now he had the chance to pass on some of that knowledge; his only worry was the idea of staying in one place for the next few years.

* * *

At the end of supper, Solstice was on her way to the common room when Professor McGonagall called after her, "Solstice! Come along to my office, please."

She complied rather unwillingly, remembering the vigorous scoldings she'd received the last few times she'd been in that office. However, Professor McGonagall didn't appear to be angry about anything as she opened the door of her office and ushered Solstice in.

As she entered the room, Solstice saw a stranger rising from his chair.

"This is Professor Greenwood," Professor McGonagall told her.

Solstice eyed him uncertainly. He was tall, with dark brown hair swept back from his face and reaching almost to his shoulders. His dark blue eyes met hers more steadily than anyone she'd yet encountered. He held out his hand to Solstice, and she shook it, then stood by the desk, feeling unsure of herself.

Professor McGonagall closed the door and indicated for Solstice to take a seat. "Tomorrow you will be changing to a new timetable," she explained. "You will drop several subjects - specifically Charms, Transfiguration and History of Magic, although you will continue to take Potions and Herbology with the rest of your year. In place of those subjects you drop, you will be taught by Professor Greenwood, who can fill you in on what you will learn instead."

She looked expectantly at Greenwood, who nodded and said, "We'll work out a timetable over the next few days. I'll need to find out what will be most useful for you to learn." His voice was quiet but very clear, with the faintest lilt of an accent that Solstice couldn't identify.

"I'm afraid we don't have an office ready for you yet, Professor Greenwood," said Professor McGonagall, "so perhaps you would care to use my office for the first few lessons?"

"I appreciate the offer, but I think that tomorrow, at least, I'll meet Solstice in the main courtyard after breakfast."

"Oh... well..." Professor McGonagall was surprised, but nodded. "As you wish." She turned to Solstice. "Directly after breakfast, mind. Don't be late."

Solstice nodded, and Professor McGonagall added kindly, "You can run along now. Goodnight."

Solstice walked slowly to the Gryffindor common room. She'd known that she would be having special lessons, but she hadn't realized that there would be no other students in the class with her, and she wasn't sure that she liked the idea.

* * *

Next morning, as directed, she was waiting in the courtyard when Professor Greenwood arrived. "This way," he told her, heading down the steps. "I thought we'd walk down to the lake and talk about what you'll be studying." Solstice followed, looking confused, and he paused, waiting until she caught up. "Don't you prefer to be outside?" he asked.

"Oh yes - but..."

He smiled. "If you were expecting a normal teacher, I'm afraid you'll be disappointed. 'Normal' was never my strong point."

If anything, Solstice was even more baffled, and seeing the girl's face, Professor Greenwood stopped, sat down on the stone steps, and indicated for Solstice to do the same. He looked at her with that steady gaze, and said, "I'll be honest with you, Solstice. I've never been a teacher before. But the Headmaster thinks that I'm the best person to teach you, because I understand what it means to be an Elemental."

Solstice frowned. "But I thought all Elementals were girls."

He nodded. "True Elementals, yes. Those born with _only_ Elemental magic, to parents with normal magic. My mother was a True Elemental, and my father was a regular wizard. Along with his magic, I inherited many of her powers and personality traits. That's how I know you prefer to be outside. There are lots of other things I understand, that an ordinary teacher wouldn't." He grinned. "I know what a shock it is when you discover you can control the weather - calling lightning, for example." Solstice turned red, as he went on, "In my case, it was myself that I almost burnt to a crisp. I was about the same age as you are now. I know it's not quite the same as trying to set fire to someone you don't like, but at the time I had no idea I could do it, and it was quite a surprise. I imagine you felt the same way?"

"I'd never done it before," Solstice admitted. "I got really angry. I just felt like I could do _something_, but I didn't know what, and the lightning just... happened."

Professor Greenwood nodded. "That's exactly why I'm here to teach you. You have to learn to control your powers, so that you don't hurt anyone with them." He glanced sideways at her, smiling, and added conspiratorially, "Even if they desperately deserve it!" Solstice smiled uncertainly, and he went on, "Yes, I know exactly what happened. The thing is, Solstice - if you go on doing things like that, someone is going to wind up dead, and it could be someone you like. Do you understand?"

She nodded.

"Well, that's a good start." He stood up. "Let's go. I'm used to being on the move." When they reached the edge of the lake, they stopped, and Professor Greenwood said, "Can you make some waves?"

Solstice walked to the very edge of the water, and looked at the smooth surface. Frowning, she reached her left hand out, as she had when calling the lightning, and the water began to ripple slightly. Taking a deep breath, she closed her eyes, concentrated, and...

Greenwood pulled her back just before the great, curving wave crashed onto the shore where she had been standing. They watched as the water trickled back into the lake; Professor Greenwood grinned. "Okay, I think we've established that you can make waves." He started walking towards the nearest trees. "Let's try something a little gentler."

They stopped under an oak tree, and Professor Greenwood stood motionless, his gaze on the upper branches. There was a fluttering, and a sparrow flew down and settled on his shoulder. He turned one palm upwards so that a robin could land on his hand. Solstice watched, entranced. Professor Greenwood glanced at her, as the birds took flight again. "Try it," he suggested.

Solstice started to stretch out her hand again, but Professor Greenwood gently stopped her. "You don't need to do that. Just look up at the trees and let your thoughts reach out."

Solstice nodded and looked up, seeking movement among the leaves. For a minute or so, nothing happened. Then Solstice changed her stance slightly, and there was a sudden rush of movement, as birds began to fly towards her. In moments, dozens of birds were crowding around her, and she raised her arms to protect her face. Professor Greenwood clapped his hands sharply, startling the birds and sending them fleeing back to the safety of the trees.

Solstice looked up at her new teacher, bemused.

Professor Greenwood smiled. "Well," he said, "one of the first things you need to learn is controlling the scale you work on." Suddenly Solstice laughed and he said, "That's better. You've been far too serious this morning." He started walking back towards the castle, and as Solstice followed, he said, "Still, I'll know who to talk to if I ever need a whole flock of birds!"

They sat on the steps again, and Professor Greenwood started to explain more about Elemental magic.

"The usual kind of magic you see at Hogwarts is very specific. It comes from within. When I want to use it, it's as if I take a little piece of it, and make it do what I want. That's a bit simplified, but it'll help you understand it. Elemental magic is less about doing, and more about knowing, and making connections. Instead of reaching inward, and calling on your own inner magic, you reach outward, and draw the natural magic of the world to you. You use the elements to work magic - hence the name. You know what the elements are, don't you?"

She nodded. "Earth, fire, water and air."

"Yes. Except that you forgot the fifth one - spirit. That's what you use when you control animals and birds, but it's much more unpredictable, because living creatures have a will of their own. And with people, it's very difficult, partly because they're conscious of their own will. But what's important to understand is that you don't have the right to control people that way. You have the ability to use your magic that way, but it doesn't mean you should. Just as it would be wrong for me to make you do something you don't want to because physically I'm bigger and stronger than you, it would be equally wrong to use Elemental magic to make people do things that they don't want to do. You see, when it's used to its greatest potential, by someone who has strong magic and has been trained to use it, Elemental magic can be far more powerful than anything most wizards can manage."

Solstice was listening intently. She'd always had the impression that her magic was somehow inferior to the other kind, because she couldn't do stuff like working charms, or transfiguring things. "Do you have strong magic?" she asked.

Professor Greenwood shook his head.

"No, because I'm not a True Elemental. I'm what's called a Secondary Elemental, because I inherited some of my mother's Elemental magic, but it's never been as strong in me as it was in her. Or in you. What I've seen today makes me think that in you it's very strong - or at least, it will be. Right now you're not powerful because you haven't learnt how to use your magic. Both kinds of magic require you to concentrate, to focus on what you want to do. But for Elemental magic, it's even more important. That's why it's when you're angry that you've done your most powerful magic. Your whole mind is focused on the thing that's making you angry. The difficult part is to be able to concentrate like that when you're calm, or worried about other things, or if you're sad or scared - or even just cold or hungry. Anything that distracts you will weaken your magic."

"How can I learn to concentrate like that?"

"There are lots of ways to do it. Some of them will seem very boring at first, I'm afraid. And practice is a huge part of it - at the moment, my Elemental magic is much more powerful than yours."

"But you just said..."

"I said I wasn't as _strong_ as you. But because I know how to control the magic I have, I can do much more than you can. You're what, eleven?" She nodded, and Greenwood went on, "That means I've had twenty years more practice than you. And I know more about what's possible. For example, I can draw down the power of the moon, to protect or heal myself or other people. I know how it's done. You can't do that now, because you don't know the ways to use the moon."

"Are you going to teach me that?"

"Yes, but not for a couple of years. You won't have parts of it - like fire or moon magic - until you're a little older. And to use them effecively, and safely, you'll need to to learn a lot of self-control. And that's where we're going to start."

* * *

**LATE NOVEMBER**

Lily scowled at James Potter across the common room. She was having a really bad week, and it was all because of Potter and his gang. Every chance they got, they'd been playing pranks on Lily and her friends. Stupid things, mostly, like the essay she'd spent hours on, only to find that the ink had been bewitched to vanish after she handed it in. She'd lost house points for that. Solstice had required a brief trip to the hospital wing after her Potions notebook unexpectedly sprouted sharp teeth and bit her fingers.

Perhaps the cruelest prank had been played on Severus; for a whole day, any food he touched had turned into soap. Not only did he go hungry that day, but it had given his Slytherin tablemates more material for taunting him. There had been more pranks along those lines - not really harmful, but annoying. She was getting tired of wondering what was going to happen next.

She glanced at the boys again, and saw them in a huddle, whispering excitedly. Lily grabbed her books and headed to her dormitory. Boys couldn't get to the girls' dormitories, which meant that there was at least one place where she could find a little peace. Not that she wanted to spend all her evenings up there, as Solstice had been doing lately. Lily was surprised by this; it wasn't like Solstice to back off from a fight.

Lily reached the dormitory, and stopped in the doorway, puzzled. Solstice was sitting cross-legged in the middle of the room, gazing intently at a solitary candle on the floor in front of her. When Lily opened the door, a draught caught the candle flame which flickered and danced. Solstice blinked and looked up.

"What are you doing?" Lily asked, going into the room and dumping her books on her bed.

"Meditating," Solstice replied. She got up, put the candle on her bedside table, and went to sit in the window alcove. It was her favourite place to sit, and the other girls had once found her asleep there in the morning. "I have to learn to meditate. Professor Greenwood says it will help me concentrate."

"So - you just look at a candle? What do you think about?"

"Well - I'm supposed to look at the flame, and only think about its shape, and how the flame behaves, but it's hard. I can do it for a few minutes, but then I start thinking about other stuff. But Professor Greenwood says it's the most basic skill of all, so I want to get good at it."

Lily grinned. Since Solstice had started her special lessons, she'd been talking of little else, and there was just a tiny touch of hero-worship in her attitude to her teacher.

This evening, though, there was something else on her mind. "We have to think of a way to get that James Potter. Him and his stupid friends won't leave us alone; and they were really mean to Sev."

Lily nodded. "They were planning something when I came upstairs. The trouble is, I can't think of anything good to get them back."

"I've thought of a few things," Solstice said. She looked out of the window. It had started to snow that evening, and already there was a light covering on the window ledges. "If it snows a bit more, there's one thing we can do. But we need lots of ideas - good things, not silly little things. Magic stuff."

"Well - I can transfigure a few things. And there's some charms I might be able to do. But..." She looked at Solstice doubtfully. "It's not very much. And what could you do?"

Solstice slid down from her perch by the window, and Lily wondered if she was cross at her mentioning Solstice's lack of magical skills, but the other girl grinned. "I can do other stuff that you can't!" She took a running jump onto her bed, bouncing on her hands and knees. "I've got some ideas. But I'll save them for later. If we just get enough snow - and Professor Greenwood says that now it's almost December, it'll snow a lot - I've got a plan that doesn't need any magic at all!"

* * *

It had snowed every day for over a week, and Solstice and Lily intended to take full advantage of it. It was Saturday, and Solstice was crouched at the top of a steep, almost vertical bank, waiting. Around and behind her, snowballs were piled. She had been waiting for some time, but eventually she heard muffled footsteps running towards her along the top of the bank. Lily, who had been lookout, skidded to a stop in the snow, and gasped, "They're coming! Just like you said."

Solstice grinned. "They always come this way!"

She went to the edge of the bank and whistled softly. Severus, standing some twenty feet along the path, looked back and nodded, then crouched down behind a snow-covered bush, packing more snow around the snowball in his hands. Within minutes, he could hear voices, and when he judged they had reached the bend in the path, about ten feet ahead, he stepped out from his hiding place and hurled the snowball, hitting James Potter squarely in the face. Barely waiting to see that he'd hit his target, he turned and fled along the path towards the bank.

The four boys erupted into shouts, and began to run after him. Above the others, he heard Sirius yell, "We've got him, it's a dead end!"

But as he reached the bank, Lily and Solstice leaned down, grabbed his hands, and hauled him up to safety, then all three began to pelt the boys with snowballs. On the lower ground, the boys scraped up a few handfuls to throw, but it was no match for the three well-armed children above them, and before long all four were covered with snow from direct hits.

When the pile of snowballs was almost exhausted, Solstice said, "Ready to make a run for it?"

Lily nodded, and as Severus threw the last snowball, the three of them turned and raced through the trees to where they'd hidden a sheet of wood. It was just big enough to hold the three of them seated, and as Potter and his friends, having scrambled up the bank by now, came running into sight, Severus pushed off, and they went skimming down the long steep slope on the makeshift toboggan, their winter cloaks billowing behind them. There was no way the boys could keep up, and all they could do was shout insults after the ambushers.

All went well until the board began to drift over to the left, heading straight into the path of a little knot of older students, taking the air. With joy, Solstice realized that her nemesis, Malfoy, was among them; there was no way they could stop their descent, and they ploughed inexorably through the group.

"Hang on!" screamed Lily, and although there really wasn't much to hold onto, the three First Years managed to stay on their sled, and they swept on down the hill. Inevitably, the board eventually hit a bump in the snow, flipped up, and the children shrieked as they went flying. It was a soft landing, and knowing they now had two sets of angry victims in their wake, they scrambled to their feet and floundered onwards.

They kept running until they reached the main castle entrance. Lily was first through the doors, so that when she suddenly stopped, the other two fell over her, laughing, landing all of them in a wet, disheveled and breathless pile at the feet of Professor Dumbledore.

The Headmaster's blue eyes twinkled as he surveyed the children. "I'm glad to see you're enjoying the weather," was all he said as he strolled past them.

Lily, Solstice and Severus took refuge in the Great Hall. They were still sitting in a huddle at the top of one of the tables, eating lunch, when Potter and his gang came in. The presence of a few teachers at the High Table meant they couldn't do much, but as he passed, Potter hissed, "We're gonna get you for that!"

Sirius and Peter scowled as they passed, but Remus, bringing up the rear, just grinned at the three of them. He had no real grudge against them, and had frankly enjoyed the morning's skirmish.


	4. A Darker Path

EARLY APRIL

The moment he saw the vacant space at the table, Snape was suspicious. Usually, his fellow First Year Slytherins found it the height of humour to spread out at mealtimes, so that there was no space for him, forcing him to find a place among the older students, where he was equally unwelcome. Such a conveniently-empty spot looked planned; they probably had something special arranged for today. But if he looked for another spot, they would think he was afraid of them. He kept his head up, and walked defiantly to the empty space.

For a couple of minutes, the other kids ignored him. Then, as he was lifting a forkful of food to his mouth, his elbow was violently jogged, scattering the food over the table. There was a ripple of laughter around him, and he stared angrily at his plate, not wanting to give them the satisfaction of a response. After a few moments, he resumed eating, but as he was slicing a piece of meat, another sharp blow connected, this time knocking the knife out of his hand. It skittered across the table, and Snape only just grabbed it before Avery, across from him, could take it. Snape clamped down on his anger; making him lose his temper was, he had realized, the ultimate goal of many of their games, and he wasn't about to let them win this time.

The meal progressed in this fashion for a while, until a shrewd blow caught him in the ribs, and he gasped at the sudden pain; unfortunately he inhaled a crumb of food, and began to choke. The students around him set up a jeering chorus of disgust, and when Snape reached for his water goblet, Mulciber, seated on his right, quickly knocked it over, so that its contents spilled onto Snape's plate.

The laughter this provoked was suddenly cut short; the other students fell silent, looking up at a point over Snape's shoulder. "What's going on here?" Snape didn't have to turn around to know it was Malfoy. There was a long, tense moment of silence, then Lucius Malfoy said, "I asked you all a question."

There was an edge to his voice, and Avery muttered resentfully, "...not even a prefect any more..."

"What did you just say?" Malfoy hissed; it was fortunate for Avery that he was on the other side of the table. "Prefect – or not..." he continued, his tone acidic, "...I have a duty to interfere when I see this kind of disgusting bullying going on!"

The First Years were speechless at the injustice of Lucius Malfoy, of all people, scolding them for bullying.

"Who tipped over the water?" Malfoy demanded. Mulciber raised his hand, too scared to speak. Malfoy stared at him for a few seconds, noting with satisfaction that even without a prefect's authority, he still had the ability to terrify the younger students. "Change your plate with his," he ordered. Mulciber gazed at him in dismay, but didn't move, and Malfoy smacked the boy's head. "Are you deaf?" he demanded, leaning closer. Mulciber shrank away from him, and did as he was told, pushing his still-full plate towards Snape, and moving the water-logged dish to his own place.

Even that, apparently, didn't satisfy Malfoy, who was still glaring at him. "Well? Start eating!"

Mulciber looked down at the ruined food, torn between fear of the tall Seventh Year, and revulsion at the mess on the plate. Suddenly, Malfoy's fingers clamped the back of his neck in a bruising grip, forcing his face towards the plate.

Leaning over the boy, Malfoy said in a soft, menacing voice, "Either you start eating, or I shove it down your throat myself. Your choice!" Shaking slightly, Mulciber picked up a fork and began to shovel the nauseating mush into his mouth. He managed to swallow one mouthful, but gagged on the second. From the corner of his eye, Malfoy saw Professor McGonagall rise from her seat at the High Table, looking in his direction; the Gryffindor head would feel no compunction at interfering with Slytherins if she saw fit. Abruptly, he released Mulciber, and straightened up. "Finish your meal," he said, and strode back to his own seat.

Moments later, Professor McGonagall reached the silent group of First Years. "Is everything all right, boys?" she asked, her tone indicating that she knew perfectly well that it wasn't. Several of the boys cast nervous glances in Malfoy's direction. He appeared to be engrossed in his own lunch, but they knew that if they complained, they would suffer the consequences later in the common room.

"Everything's fine, Professor McGonagall." It was Snape who spoke up, though he kept his eyes fixed on the table.

Professor McGonagall looked sharply at the subdued Slytherins, but contented herself with saying,"See that it stays that way." She looked in Malfoy's direction, and this time he looked up, meeting her eyes with an insolent gaze. She stared back, her expression clearly showing that she had a good idea of what had been going on. But with the First Years refusing to say anything, there was little she could do. She turned stiffly and walked away from the Slytherin table, leaving the First Years to finish eating in silence, and Malfoy to smile smugly to himself.

* * *

As Snape left the Great Hall, Malfoy fell into step with him. "You shouldn't let those boys pick on you," he said abruptly.

Snape nodded unhappily. "I don't know what to do about it," he admitted. "I tried ignoring them, but..."

"That won't work with their sort, they're not the type to give up so easily." He stopped walking, and looked at Snape for a few moments, a calculating expression on his pale features. "I could give you a few suggestions. I'll see you in the common room tonight, ten o'clock." He turned and walked away, leaving Snape wondering uneasily what Malfoy's suggestions might entail.

That evening, Snape was finishing his homework when Malfoy approached. "Come with me," he commanded, and walked out of the common room. Snape followed him, noting that Malfoy's hair now hung past his shoulders; since the infamous incident when his hair had been scorched, it had grown at an unlikely rate, and general opinion was that he'd been helping it with magic. It was not an opinion that anyone had expressed in his hearing.

They entered one of the dungeon classrooms, now dark and silent. Malfoy flicked his wand at the fireplace, and the fire blazed into life. Another flick, and several candles in the holders above the fireplace ignited. Malfoy placed a box he had been carrying on the nearest desk. Something was moving inside the box, tiny claws scratching on wood. Malfoy opened the box to reveal a scrawny black rat, which peered nervously over the edge, whiskers quivering.

"We need a subject to work on," he explained. He looked at Snape. "The best approach with those boys is to make sure they're afraid to bother you again. The quickest way to do that is with a curse, so I'm going to teach you the Imperius curse. Simple but effective – and quite entertaining."

"But..." Snape hesitated, not wanting to argue with Malfoy. "Isn't that an Unforgivable curse?"

Malfoy grinned. "Only if you get caught." He pointed his wand at the rat and said, "Imperio!" The rat, which had been sniffing around the rim of the box, suddenly crouched down, quite still and docile. "Turn around," Malfoy said. The rat quickly turned to face the other way. "Lie down." It flattened against the bottom of the box. "Sleep." The beady eyes closed, the rat's breathing slowed.

"Finite Incantatum!" Malfoy prodded the rat with his wand to wake it. It sniffed the air cautiously. Malfoy looked up at Snape. "Try it."

Snape pulled his wand from his pocket and pointed it at the rat. "Imperio!" The rat ambled into the corner of the box. "Imperio!" Unconcerned, the rodent began to groom.

Malfoy nodded, as if he'd expected this. "It will only work if you really mean it," he explained.

Snape frowned in concentration and said once more, "Imperio!" This time, the rat froze as it had done when Malfoy used the curse. He made the rat perform some simple actions, before he ended the spell.

"That's good – so far as it goes," Malfoy said. "We've been making it do easy things, that it has no reason to resist. The next step is to make it do something it doesn't want to do." He reached into the box, picked up the rat by the scruff of its neck, and crouched beside the hearth, then put it down, facing the fire. "Imperio! Now – walk towards the fire."

The rat took a couple of steps, hesitated, then a couple more. It wasn't close enough yet to get burnt, but it was clearly afraid. It continued walking, fighting against every step. Snape looked up at Malfoy, expecting him to make the rat stop; but Malfoy was quite still, on his knees, watching the frightened creature intently, a strange glitter in his eyes. The rat seemed terrified now, a couple more steps and it would start to suffer from the heat of the flames. It squeaked in terror, and Snape suddenly pointed his wand and said, "Finite Incantatum!"

Instantly, the rat turned and scuttled away from the fire, disappearing into the darkness of the classroom. Malfoy whipped around, and Snape shrank back from the fury in the older boy's icy-grey eyes. Then Malfoy seemed to catch himself, and got up abruptly. He picked up the box and strode from the room without a backward glance.

Snape was still crouching by the fire; he felt a sense of awe at how effective the Imperius curse could be; but at the same time there was a quiver of sick fear in the pit of his stomach at what he had just witnessed. Would Malfoy actually have forced the rat to walk into the fire? Of course not, he told himself, he was just seeing if Snape would intervene... wasn't he? After repeating this to himself a few times, he almost believed it. He got to his feet, extinguished the fire and candles, and made his way to bed, deep in thought.

* * *

"What's the matter? Are you deaf as well as stupid?"

Snape clenched his fists at his sides, but kept on walking. The four boys who customarily bedeviled him at mealtimes had expanded their repertoire to following him around at odd moments, hurling insults and occasionally jostling him. On this afternoon, the First Year Slytherins had a free period; after a couple of days of rain, the weather had suddenly turned hot, and Snape had hoped to find a quiet place in the grounds where he could sit unobserved and make a start on his homework, but it looked as if he wasn't going to be allowed to do that.

Two of the boys would probably have become bored fairly quickly, but Avery and Mulciber were tenacious and intelligent, quick to identify weak spots, and often creative in exploiting them. Snape's hand went to his pocket, and he fingered his wand. He hadn't yet tried out the Imperious curse on his own, still a little disturbed by Malfoy's apparent cruelty when demonstrating it. He kept walking, wondering how to shake the other boys.

"He's ignoring us. That's really rude," Avery said loudly.

"Yeah – we should teach him some manners." A second later there was a thud on the turf just in front of him, and a stone, thrown by Mulciber bounced at Snape's feet. A second stone brushed his leg, then one reached its target, catching Snape just behind the ear. He gave a yelp of pain and spun around, suddenly furious. He pulled his wand from his pocket, pointed it at Avery, and yelled, "Imperio!"

Avery stopped dead, staring at Snape, his eyes wide with surprise. Quickly, Snape flicked his wand at Mulciber and repeated the curse. Now both boys were standing still, their eyes fixed on Snape. Behind them, the other two glanced at each other, and Snape saw, with a thrill of satisfaction, the fear in their eyes, before they turned and ran.

Snape turned his attention back to his two victims. "You're always looking for a fight," he sneered. "Well – why don't you – fight each other!"

Mulciber swung an awkward punch at Avery, catching him a glancing blow on the chin, as Avery tried to dodge and then lunged at Mulciber. Moments later they were kicking and punching each other, their faces betraying a mix of anger and fear. Snape watched them, relishing the unfamiliar feeling of power. What else, he wondered, could he make them do?

"Stop!" The two boys staggered back from each other, panting. Snape looked at Mulciber, then glanced at the muddy ground at his feet. "Eat dirt," he commanded.

With satisfaction, he watched Mulciber drop to his knees, and scoop up a handful of muck. He seemed to struggle for a moment, then put the mud into his mouth. "Stop doing it," he begged, choking, even as he reached down for another handful.

"Get up then!" Now he had control of these two, Snape found the power intoxicating. His eyes flickered to the lake, and he grinned. "Both of you – go down to the lake." He followed them, and as they reached the water, he said, "Stop there." Here, the rocky ledge overhung the water, and he knew it was quite deep. "Mulciber – go jump in the lake," he said, grinning.

Without hesitation, Mulciber leapt off the rock, entering the water with a resounding splash. He surfaced spluttering, and began to tread water. Snape turned to Avery, who now looked terrified. "I can't swim," he gasped but Snape snarled, "Do I look like I care? Just jump..."

"Finite Incantatum!" roared a voice behind Snape.

Avery sagged, trembling, and Snape spun around to find Professor Slughorn bearing down on him. The Professor caught Snape by the shoulders and shook him, as Mulciber swam to the shore and clambered out of the water. "What the devil are you doing?" he demanded. "That's an Unforgivable curse! Do you know what happens to wizards who use Unforgivable curses, boy?"

Jolted back to his familiar feeling of powerlessness, Snape shook his head mutely, though he knew perfectly well what the punishment was.

"Azkaban," roared Professor Slughorn. "They go to Azkaban. You know what that is, don't you?"

"Y-yes sir. Wizard prison... Dementors..."

"That's right!" Professor Slughorn had to pause for breath. Beside him, Snape could see his two other tormentors; they must have run straight for Professor Slughorn. "It's lucky you're only twelve, Snape!" Professor Slughorn said. He was no longer shouting. "If you were of age, you'd be looking at serious time in Azkaban. As it is..." He stared at Snape, shaking his head. "Professor Dumbledore will have to deal with you."

* * *

Snape sat on the hard chair, across from Professor Dumbledore, and stared at his hands. He had retreated into a defensive silence, refusing to answer any questions. Professor Slughorn had marched him, along with the four other boys, to the Headmaster's office, where Mulciber and Avery had given a blow-by-blow account of Snape's actions. In the process, their own misdeeds leading up to Snape's use of the curse had been conveniently forgotten; but despite Snape's refusal to speak, even in his own defense, Professor Dumbledore had a shrewd idea of what had been going on.

Finally, he dismissed the four with a warning that he would speak to each of them individually later that day. When they were gone, Professor Dumbledore exchanged a glance with Professor Slughorn. Quietly, he said, "Severus – where did you learn the Imperius curse?" Snape said nothing, and Professor Dumbledore said, "Please answer me!"

There was an edge of steel in his tone, and Snape muttered, "I read about it."

"You read about it? And which professor gave you the permission slip?"

Snape looked up, puzzled. "Permission slip?"

Professor Dumbledore nodded. "Books which describe the Unforgivable curses are in the restricted section. You would need a permission slip to go there. Who gave it to you?"

"I... I don't know," Snape said lamely, dropping his gaze.

"I thought as much. I think, perhaps, that you actually learnt it from someone at Hogwarts..." Professor Dumbledore turned to Professor Slughorn. "Professor, please ask Mr. Malfoy to join us?" Snape flinched slightly, something which did not go unnoticed by Professor Dumbledore. Professor Slughorn left the room, and five minutes later – during which time Snape glowered determinedly at his shoes – he returned with Malfoy in tow.

Malfoy's expression hardened when he saw Snape, guessing instantly what must have happened. He said nothing, however, as he took the seat indicated by Professor Dumbledore.

"Mr. Malfoy..." Professor Dumbledore's tone was almost conversational. "Mr. Snape used the Imperius curse on several other boys this afternoon. Do you happen to know where he learned it?"

"I'm afraid not, Professor." Malfoy's tone was calm, his voice firm.

"You're quite sure of that?" Professor Dumbledore watched him intently, but Malfoy kept his gaze fixed on a point on the desk, careful not to meet Professor Dumbledore's eyes for even a moment.

"Quite sure, Professor."

After a brief silence, Professor Dumbledore turned back to Snape. "Severus – did Mr. Malfoy teach you the Imperius curse?"

Malfoy tensed, waiting for the answer that would condemn him. He was well aware that at almost eighteen, he would certainly be dealt with as an adult when it came to Unforgivable curses.

"No, Sir." Snape's voice was steady. Malfoy glanced at him, barely able to conceal his surprise.

"You need not be afraid to answer honestly," Professor Dumbledore told the younger boy, his voice gentle.

"I read it in a book," Snape said stubbornly.

Professor Dumbledore looked at him steadily. It appeared that there was no other way... "Severus – look at me." Snape looked up. Professor Dumbledore looked deep into the black eyes, searching, and saw... nothing. He frowned slightly, continuing to probe for the information he sought, but it was as if he looked into an impenetrable fog. "Very well," he said at length. "Please go directly to your dormitory and stay there until Professor Slughorn gives you permission leave it."

Wordlessly, Snape got up and walked out of the room. After the door was closed, Professor Dumbledore turned his attention back to Malfoy. "It appears that I must take you at your word." Malfoy nodded, and Professor Dumbledore noted the hint of smugness in his expression, though he still refused to meet the headmaster's gaze. "You are almost at the end of your time at Hogwarts," Professor Dumbledore continued. "You have a great capacity for influencing others – as I'm sure you are already aware. I urge you to use that gift wisely, Lucius, during your final months here - and especially when you leave us."

Malfoy inclined his head, but did not reply. Professor Dumbledore sighed inwardly, knowing that his words carried little weight with the young man who had been raised to regard himself as accountable to no-one.

"You may go, Mr. Malfoy."

Malfoy rose. "Thank you, Professor Dumbledore." His voice held the faintest hint of amused insolence, but Professor Dumbledore let it pass.

As the door closed behind Malfoy, Dumbledore shook his head regretfully. Then he frowned slightly, and said musingly, "It would seem that young Severus is a natural Occlumens." Professor Slughorn looked surprised, as Professor Dumbledore continued, "Remarkable in a child of his age. He is a boy who will need careful guidance – I only hope I can be more successful with him than I have been with Lucius." He looked up at Professor Slughorn. "The decision rests with you, as head of Slytherin, as to the nature of Snape's punishment. I will talk to him myself in a day or two. He must be left in no doubt as to the seriousness of his actions. I would have no choice but to expel him, except that I am convinced that it was Lucius's idea in the first place."

After Professor Slughorn departed, Professor Dumbledore sat for a long time, deep in thought. He would provide all the care and guidance within his power, if it would prevent Severus from following the same dark path that he feared Lucius Malfoy had already chosen.


	5. What Lies Beneath

**SECOND YEAR - NOVEMBER**

"There they go again!"

Solstice looked up at Lily's words, and the girls watched the Marauders (as they had apparently started to call themselves) slip out of the Gryffindor common room. For the past few weeks, it had become increasingly common for the four boys to vanish for an hour or so in the evening, returning with damp hair.

"They can't be swimming in the lake," Lily said. "It's far too cold for that."

Solstice nodded, frowning. "And if anyone asks where they've been, they just laugh," she said, deep in thought. "I bet it's somewhere they're not supposed to be." She grabbed Lily's arm. "Let's follow them and see where they go!"

Lily grinned and the two girls bundled their books onto a table and dashed through the portrait hole. They followed the boys at a distance, careful not to be seen, although the boys were far too engrossed in their adventure to worry about being followed. Finally, on the fifth floor, they stopped at one of the doors, using a password to gain access. Lily and Solstice exchanged a glance, then returned to the common room. "Once they get back," Solstice said, "we'll go and see what's in there."

As it turned out, it was almost eleven before the Marauders returned, so the girls decided to leave their investigation until the next day. As soon as the last lesson was over on the following afternoon, they retraced their steps of the night before. Using the password they had overheard, they opened the door and slipped inside the room.

"This is the Prefects' Bathroom," Lily said. "They must come in here to swim - it's as big as a swimming pool."

Solstice nodded. "I wouldn't mind swimming in it myself."

* * *

A day or two later, during Double Potions with the Slytherins, Lily suddenly turned to Solstice. "I just had a thought...!"

"Did it hurt?"

Lily ignored the lame joke. "I think we could use this colouring potion to get Potter and his gang." Solstice grinned, as Lily continued, "We could make it really strong and put it in the Prefects' bath, and then we'd get them all at once. Potter's always boasting now about being on the Gryffindor Quidditch team - we should dye him to match his Quidditch robes!"

Solstice's eyes sparkled with mischief. "Be even funnier if we dyed him Slytherin colours!"

Lily laughed, and Professor Slughorn looked up from his desk at the front of the room. "Have you finished your potion, Miss Evans?"

"Yes, Professor," Lily replied with a hint of smugness.

Professor Slughorn nodded indulgently. Lily, with her obvious talent for his subject, was something of a favourite of his.

* * *

Over the next few days, Lily and Solstice spent most of their free time experimenting with the colouring potion; both had a flair for the subject, and before long they had hit on a formula that would dye anything in a swirling pattern of green and silver. They then spent an evening in the library, and with what they learnt there, they achieved a potion that would last for a week or more before fading completely.

The next problem was how to add it to the bath water. If they put it in ahead of time, there was a chance that the wrong person would get dyed. It was Solstice who suggested waiting until the boys were already in the water; they would only need to open the door a crack, and then Lily would quietly levitate the bottle over to the bath, and pour the potion into the water without the boys noticing. Solstice, of course, couldn't do the levitation, so she would keep watch in the corridor while Lily worked the spell.

On Saturday evening, Lily and Solstice kept a close watch on the Marauders. As expected, about halfway through the evening, the boys sneaked out of the common room. Knowing their destination, the girls gave them ten minutes before following. The fifth floor hallway was dark and quiet. Solstice waited at the corner nearest the bathroom, while Lily crept along to the door. She spoke the password very quietly, and opened the bathroom door a little way, waiting to see if the boys had noticed. After a minute, she pulled a bottle from her pocket, uncorked it, and pointed her wand. The bottle rose off the floor a few inches, and Lily pushed the door a little further open, so she could see to guide it.

From her place down the hall, Solstice could only see Lily crouched by the doorway, frowning in concentration. After a couple of minutes, she started to straighten up, putting her wand in her pocket. Then she froze, and whipped the wand back out, pointing through the narrow gap in the doorway. Whatever she was doing took her some minutes, but finally she drew something dark through the doorway. Very slowly and quietly, she closed the bathroom door; then scooped a bundle into her arms, and ran down the hall towards Solstice.

"Come on," she called, running past her. She headed in the direction of the common room, but once they were safely away from the bathroom, she stopped, slightly out of breath.

"Did you do it?" Solstice demanded.

Lily nodded. "They never noticed a thing - too busy fooling around."

Solstice looked curiously at the bundle in her friend's arms. "What's that?"

Lily began to giggle. "I took their clothes! They'll have to come back to the common room in towels!"

Solstice started to laugh. "What shall we do with the clothes? Hide them around the common room? We could do it when everyone's gone to bed, so they won't get them back till at least tomorrow." Lily nodded, and the girls fled along the hallway and up the stairs, trying to stifle their laughter. Once they were through the portrait hole, they dashed straight up to their dormitory and dumped the pile of clothes on the floor. "We'll shove them under my bed for now," Solstice said, but as she bent to gather the pile, something brightly coloured caught her eye. She pulled at it, then froze. Slowly, she turned to Lily, her face incredulous, and held up a pair of lurid pink boxer shorts.

Lily gaped at the unlikely garment. "Who would wear something like that?" she said slowly. Her eyes met Solstice's; in unison they said, "Sirius!"

The girls collapsed on Solstice's bed, shouting with laughter. "Only Black... would have the nerve... to wear them!" Solstice gasped, lying on her back, with the shocking-pink shorts still clutched in her hand. Finally Lily sat up, catching her breath.

"This is too good to keep to ourselves," she said. "Somehow, we've got to let everyone else see them - and who they belong to - but not so he knows it's us."

Solstice also sat up, tucking her legs under her. Her face was thoughtful. "Fish out the other underpants," she said suddenly. They scrambled off the bed and sorted through the pile of clothes, coming up with some blue Y-fronts, a pair of white briefs, and...

"Urghhh!" Lily looked revolted, pulled out her wand, and gingerly used it to lift a greyish, shapeless garment.

Solstice wrinkled her nose in disgust. "I bet those are Pettigrew's," she said.

"So what are we going to do with them?" Lily asked. Solstice grinned, and to an accompaniment of giggles from Lily, explained her idea. "Too bad we have to wait till next term to do it, though," Lily said.

"Yeah, but by then, they'll have forgotten all about it, so it'll be a bigger surprise. Look, don't bother with hiding the other stuff in the common room, let's just dump itoutside their dormitory. Then they'll find the underwear's missing, and they'll wonder..."

* * *

"Water's getting cold," Remus remarked, floating lazily.

"It's well past eleven - we've been here a couple of hours," James said. He ducked under the water and surfaced by the edge of the pool, sleeking the water from his hair. He paused, rubbing his hands together. "That's strange - the water feels a bit oily... anyway, maybe we should get out. If we get caught, that'll be the end of swimming here."

He hoisted himself out to sit on the side of the pool, reached for a towel and rubbed his hair briskly, then stood up, wrapping the towel around his waist. As the other boys climbed out, James walked to the bench near the door where they had all dumped their clothes. He stopped, frowning, and looked around. "Who moved the clothes?" he asked, turning to his friends. None of them had, and they began to search the bathroom, quickly establishing that their clothes were nowhere to be found.

"Where the hell did they go?" Sirius said, exasperated.

Remus turned to Peter. "Didn't you say you heard someone at the door earlier?"

Peter nodded. "I thought so, but no-one came in - wouldn't we have noticed if they did?"

James shrugged impatiently. "Well someone must have! Maybe - maybe they Summoned them out... the point is, we have to get back to the dormitory, and all we have is towels."

The Marauders looked at each other in dismay.

"Getting caught in the hallway after hours is one thing," Remus said, "we can talk our way out of that - but not if we're only wearing towels!"

"We could try Summoning our clothes," Peter suggested, but Sirius snapped,

"With what? My wand was in the pocket of my robe. Does anyone have theirs? Didn't think so!" He checked that his towel was wrapped securely, and went to the door. "Well - no point waiting around. Let's get going, and get it over with." He opened the door and peered out into the hallway. "Come on - there's no-one around."

* * *

Apart from a narrow escape when they heard Professor McGonagall's voice from the other end of a hallway, and had to run up the nearest staircase to avoid being seen, the Marauders made it back to the common room without getting caught. The Fat Lady greeted their appearance with slightly tipsy giggles, but eventually opened the portrait hole for them.

Remus was last in, and as the portrait swung shut, it caught the corner of his towel, and he squawked in horror as he felt the towel start unwrapping itself from around his waist. He freed it with a tug, and rewrapped it hurriedly, looking around to see if anyone had seen, but to his relief, the common room appeared to be empty, apart from the three other Marauders. They dashed across the room, heading for their dormitory. As their footsteps died away on the stairs, two heads peered from behind a shabby sofa in the darkest corner of the common room. Lily and Solstice exchanged glances, stifling their laughter.

"For a minute there, I thought Lupin was going to give us a peek!" Lily spluttered. She glanced towards the staircase. "Right about now, they'll be finding their clothes outside their dormitory, and thinking they're safe." She chuckled. "And the potion should be taking effect soon - if it worked!"

"We'll find out tomorrow," Solstice said yawning. "Let's go to bed, I want to be up early to see the fun."

* * *

After their late night, the boys slept in; it was past nine the next morning when Peter stumbled out of bed and into the bathroom. Seconds later his yell of shock jolted the other three instantly awake. By the time Peter ran back into the room, they were out of bed, staring horrified at each other. Every inch of skin was either emerald green or iridescent silver, and their hair was similarly coloured.

James dashed to the bathroom and began to scrub his hands and arms. "It doesn't come off," he yelled. He ran back to the dormitory. "What the hell happened? We were fine last night when we..." he paused, light beginning to dawn, "...when we got out of the bath! It must have been something in the water - I said it felt oily!"

"How long does it last?" Peter asked anxiously.

"Oh, how should I know?" James demanded.

"Maybe - maybe one of the teachers can make it come off. Or Madam Pomfrey - she has to cope with all kinds of weird things happening to students. I bet she has something that can change us back to normal," Remus said hopefully.

"Well, let's go then!" Sirius began to pull on whatever clothes were closest, and the other boys followed his example. James, Remus and Sirius were ready in a couple of minutes, but Peter was still scrabbling among his clothes.

"Come on, Peter," James said impatiently.

"I can't find my underpants. I'm sure they were here last night."

"Just get another pair..."

"But - I don't - that's my only pair!"

"What?" James looked scandalized. "You only have one pair of pants?" He stared at Peter for a few moments, then yanked open a drawer beside his own bed, grabbed a pair of Y-fronts and threw them at Peter. "Now hurry up!"

Five minutes later, the boys ran down the stairs then stopped at the threshold of the common room. There were already quite a few students scattered around. The Marauders looked at each other - there was no way they could get through without someone noticing their green and silver colouring. Finally, James led the way; and as they hurried across the room, students fell silent, turning to look at the unexpected sight.

"What happened to you?" asked a boy sitting by the fire.

"That's what we'd like to know," Sirius yelled over his shoulder, as they climbed out through the portrait hole, and vanished in the direction of the hospital wing.

Seated on the same sofa they'd hidden behind the night before, Solstice and Lily looked at each other with suppressed glee. "It worked!" Lily hissed, barely able to hide her delight. Solstice nodded.

"They're covered! Even their hair. I bet they're going to Madam Pomfrey to see if she can reverse it."

"You think she can?" Lily looked disappointed.

Solstice shrugged as she answered, "Maybe. But at least we got to see them!" She jumped up, pulling Lily with her. "Breakfast!" she said. "I think playing jokes on people makes me hungry!"

She and Lily scrambled through the portrait hole, giggling together as they headed to the Great Hall."

* * *

The Marauders returned in the afternoon, their expressions glum and their spectacular colours intact.

"Madam Pomfrey couldn't do anything," James said, in reply to the barrage of questions that greeted them. "She said we'll just have to let it fade."

"So it will fade then?" the Gryffindor Quidditch captain asked anxiously.

"She's - fairly sure..."

"Because I don't fancy playing the next match with our Seeker the colour of the Slytherins!"

"What? But that's not till January. I'll be okay by then - I have to be!" James was horrified by this new side of his predicament. He turned and headed back to the portrait hole, herding his fellow-Marauders ahead of him. "Come on - maybe we can find a cure, there's got to be some book in the library that..."

"The library? On a Sunday?" protested Peter, but James ignored him.

Solstice and Lily were standing at the edge of the group that had been gathered around the four boys, and as they passed, Lily suddenly called out,

"Hey Black - what happened to your eyebrows."

Sirius glared at her. "One of the spells Madam Pomfrey tried made them fall out. They'll grow back - she said so!" The boys clambered out through the portrait hole, with the galling sound of Lily's laughter following them.

* * *

As expected, the brilliant colours began to fade after a couple of days, and by the following weekend the boys were almost back to normal, apart from a faint greenish tinge in certain lights; and as promised, Sirius's eyebrows were starting to grow back.

However, instead of celebrating, the Marauders seemed faintly nervous, and ill-at-ease. Returning to the common room after dinner on Sunday, one of the prefects glanced around and demanded, "Where's Lupin? Was he with you at dinner?"

James and Sirius exchanged wary glances, and Sirius replied, "Yeah, but he - er - didn't feel well. He's - um - gone to the hospital wing."

Following behind, Lily and Solstice overheard the explanation, and looked at each other. Lily nodded towards the stairs, and Solstice followed her to the dormitory. "Do you think it was the colouring potion that made him ill? I mean, they're a bunch of prats, but we didn't want to really hurt them..."

Solstice gazed at Lily for a few moments, then shook her head. "Shouldn't think so. The others are okay."

"Yes - I think you're right. Besides..." Lily looked relieved as she continued, "He's been ill before. Haven't you noticed that every so often he goes to the hospital wing for a few days. Maybe he has a - a weak stomach or something."

Solstice nodded, and wandered to the window. "Look, isn't the moon beautiful tonight? It must be just about full."

Lily joined her, kneeling in the window alcove and gazing out at the moonlit grounds. Suddenly, she turned to Solstice. "Let's go out!" she said. Solstice looked at her, faintly puzzled.

"I thought you didn't like going out after dark."

"Oh, I don't mind it any more. I went out all the time over the summer. It's fun, everything looks so different."

"Ok!" Solstice jumped from the window alcove to Lily's bed, then attempted to jump to her own bed, missed, and thudded to the floor. Lily giggled, opening the door of her wardrobe and reaching for her cloak.

"You make more noise than a herd of hippogriffs," she teased.

Solstice scrambled to her feet, and collected her own cloak. "Wouldn't that be a flock of hippogriffs?" she pondered. "After all, they can fly..."

"Yeah, but they're part horse too, I think it's a herd."

They ran down the stairs together, arguing good-naturedly.

* * *

Once they were out in the grounds, they kept to the shadows at first to avoid being seen from the windows. Darting past the greenhouses, they made for the sparsely-growing trees that marked the beginning of the Forbidden Forest, then Lily led the way past the Whomping Willow. They kept running for some ten or fifteen minutes, until Solstice slowed to a walk.

"Where are we headed?" she panted as she caught up to Lily, who had stopped to wait for her.

"To the front gates. I want to look at the statues - you know, the winged boars."

Solstice shrugged. "Okay."

They continued at a walk, but had only gone a dozen steps or so when a faint but unmistakable howl split the silence. Both girls stopped, looking around. "Was that - in the forest?" Lily whispered.

Solstice shook her head. "I don't think so..." Hesitantly she pointed past the gates. "I think it was..." As she spoke, another, louder howl echoed through the crisp, clear night air. "That definitely came from Hogsmeade!" The girls looked at each other uneasily.

"Maybe we should go back..." Solstice suggested. Lily nodded, and they turned and headed back towards the castle.

They made it to the Whomping Willow before their luck ran out. Having come that far keeping close to the trees, they decided to make a run for it across the grass. They skirted the tree, but before they could go any further, Professor McGonagall suddenly stepped out from behind the tree. It was hard to say whether they or the Professor were more surprised, but predictably, it was Professor McGonagall who recovered her composure first.

"Miss Evans! Miss Flidae! What is the meaning of this?"

Lily gulped. "We - um - we're just out for a walk..."

"A walk? At this time of night? Perhaps detention next Saturday will help you remember that there are times when you may not just take a walk, Miss Evans." Her steely gaze switched to Solstice. "As I recall, Miss Flidae, this is not the first time I have caught you in the grounds after hours. In addition to Saturday, you will also report for detention next Sunday."

Solstice opened her mouth as if to protest, but thought better of it in the face of Professor McGonagall's glare. Lily, however, spoke up. "Professor - it was my idea to come outside tonight..."

"Indeed? In that case, you will also spend Sunday in detention. Back to the castle this minute. And you will both go straight to bed after dinner all week!"

The two girls followed the Professor as she strode towards the castle. After a few minutes, Solstice ventured to say, "Professor - we heard something howling..."

Professor McGonagall looked sharply at the girl, then said, "That is hardly surprising, considering how close you were to the Forbidden Forest."

"But it wasn't from the Forest - it came from Hogsmeade."

Professor McGonagall looked hard at Solstice and Lily; finally she said, "The Forbidden Forest is not the only place you will find - dangerous creatures. You would do well to remember that the next time you feel like taking a walk after dark!" She ushered the pair back into Hogwarts in repressive silence, breaking it only long enough to remind them to go straight to bed.

* * *

Lying in bed, waiting for the three other occupants of the dormitory to come up to bed, Solstice said thoughtfully, "She knows something about whatever was howling in Hogsmeade!"

"Yes - but she's not going to tell us, is she?"

"I suppose not." Solstice sighed. "A whole weekend in detention!" she said in disgust. She turned onto her side and pulled the covers up to her chin, wondering just what they had heard that night.


	6. And Occasionally Above!

**SECOND YEAR – JANUARY**

Lily shivered as she got off the train, and pulled her cloak close around her. When she went home before Christmas, she had left Hogwarts in deep, soft snow. Now, in early January, with sleety rain falling steadily, the snow was nothing more than freezing slush. To make matters worse, she could only find one of her gloves, and her gloveless hand was already red and stinging from the cold.

All things considered, it had been a rotten journey.

Her sister had – as usual - refused to accompany their parents to see her off at Kings Cross; and she'd found herself stuck in a compartment with Potter and his cronies, without even the consolation of her own friends, as both Solstice and Snape had stayed at Hogwarts over Christmas. To cap it all, she had spent so long searching for her missing glove that by the time she reached the place where the carriages usually waited, the last one had already moved off.

Lily no longer minded being out after dark, but she already felt frozen through, and now had the prospect of at long, cold walk up to the castle. Muttering to herself, she started out, but after just a few steps, she stumbled on the uneven ground, and fell to her hands and knees, inches deep in an icy, slushy puddle. She let out a cry of sheer exasperation, but before she could clamber out, hands grasped her from behind, and she was lifted out of the puddle and set on her feet. Startled, she whirled around to see who had been following her.

"Looks like they left without us," her rescuer commented, and Lily recognized Professor Greenwood. He regarded her bedraggled appearance with sympathy. "You must be soaked – and only one glove! Here..." He pulled off his own gloves and gave them to Lily.

"Oh, I couldn't..." she began, but he grinned.

"Yes you could. It's a fair hike to the castle. I won't suffer, I assure you. I've been out in much worse than this."

He waited until Lily had put on the gloves, then started off towards the castle, moderating his pace so that Lily didn't have to run to keep up with him. "You're Lily, aren't you – Solstice's friend? She talks about you all the time..."

As they walked, Lily found herself understanding why Solstice liked him so much. He talked with her naturally, as if she were another adult, and was genuinely interested in her replies.

Lily was so engrossed in their conversation that she barely noticed the discomfort of the journey, and she was surprised to find that they had reached the stone steps leading up to the front doors. As they reached the top of the steps, Lily heard someone calling her name, and she looked up to see Solstice hurtling towards her through the downpour.

"How was your holiday? Did you get some good presents? How come you weren't in a carriage? Everyone else..."

"Miss Flidae!" Professor McGonagall's voice rang out, her tone outraged. "Back inside this minute! You don't have a cloak on – and you are not even wearing shoes!" Solstice pulled up short, spun around, and raced back towards the doors. Professor Greenwood chuckled, and when he and Lily reached the haven of the Entrance Hall, they were in time to hear Professor McGonagall concluding a sharp scolding with, "...at twelve and a half, you are quite old enough to think before you act! Straight up to your dormitory and put on some dry clothes... and look where you're going!" she added as Solstice narrowly avoided bowling over a little knot of First Years in her hurry.

Hiding a grin, Lily took off the gloves and handed them back to Professor Greenwood. "Thank you, Professor," she said.

He smiled as he took the gloves, and replied, "You're quite welcome."

After taking off her heavy winter cloak, Lily headed towards the Great Hall, and looked around, searching the faces at the Slytherin table for her other best friend. Her brows drew together in a frown as she saw Snape, already seated and talking to Avery and Mulciber. She couldn't understand why Snape had become friends with two boys who had spent most of the First Year tormenting him mercilessly.

She knew that something had happened last spring – for a full month, Snape had been in detention every night and all weekend. From the little he'd said, most of those detentions had involved cleaning up the messes that were a common feature of most Potions lessons; or failing that, rebottling some nameless horror that floated in one of the rows of jars that lined the shelves of the main Potions dungeon – although she suspected that he was secretly fascinated by the nightmarish creatures.

Avery and Mulciber, along with two other Slytherins, had received lesser punishments; and since that time they had treated Snape with a sort of wary respect. Lily knew that having friends in his own house made life slightly easier for Snape, but she couldn't help feeling uncomfortable about his choice of friends.

She took her place at the Gryffindor table, taking care to sit as far away from the Marauders as possible. Within minutes, Solstice joined her. Her hair was damp, but she had put on dry clothes, and was somewhat calmer than she had been when she greeted Lily.

Lily spent most of the meal answering Solstice's questions about what she'd done over the holidays. Finally, she had a chance to ask Solstice how her Christmas at Hogwarts had been. Solstice grinned. "It was – eventful."

Lily looked at her, wondering just what 'eventful' had entailed. She was accustomed to her friend's impulsiveness, and most of the time it was fun, but occasionally she had to admit it caused more trouble than it was worth. "Eventful how?" she asked.

"Well – on Christmas Eve, I got in a big fight with Sev... that was after my fist fight with Mulciber... but before I got locked out overnight..."

Lily's eyes widened; this had evidently been one of Solstice's wilder episodes. "Okay – what did you fight with Sev about?"

"Well, I'd been trying to talk to him all day, but he just stayed in the Slytherin common room. So after dinner, I went down to see him. I couldn't get in, of course, so I pounded on the door for a while. And Mulciber finally answered, but when I said I wanted to talk to Sev, he said he wasn't going to give him any messages, because he didn't think Sev wanted to talk to a..." She glanced around then leaned close and whispered the phrase Mulciber had used to describe her. Lily gasped, but Solstice grinned and went on. "So I said he was a..." Again she murmured in Lily's ear, and giggled as her friend blushed.

"And – what did he say then?" Lily asked.

"He didn't say anything – he just came belting out of the common room and knocked me down. So I got up and smacked his face, and that's when we really started fighting."

"Did you get caught?"

Solstice shook her head. "No – after a couple of minutes, Sev came out and dragged me off Mulciber, and said I shouldn't be fighting with his friend. I said he should tell that to Mulciber first – or was he saying that I wasn't his friend. Sev's, I mean," she added as Lily looked confused. "And Sev said..." For the first time Solstice frowned. "He said I'd never been his friend in the first place, and I only thought I was 'cause I was always tagging after you..."

"He said what?" Lily started to get up, looking over at the Slytherin table, her face flushed again, this time with anger. Solstice grabbed her arm and pulled her back into her place. "You don't have to say anything! We made it up later, and he said he didn't mean it. Well, you see we were both really cross by then," she explained, seeing Lily's sceptical expression. "We both said – stuff we shouldn't have. I – um – I told him to go and make friends with a bottle of shampoo..."

"Solstice!"

The younger girl shrugged impatiently. "I _said_ we made it up later, we both apologized. But anyway, after that, I decided I was going to send you an owl – oh, not about the fight, just to say Happy Christmas."

By this time, dinner was over; as the girls joined the crowds of students heading off to their common rooms, Lily said, "So why didn't you send the owl? I never got one."

Solstice nodded. "It was getting a bit late by then, and when I got to the Owlery, the door was locked for the night. And then, when I got back to the castle, that door was locked too. And I didn't really want to knock – not after everything Professor McGonagall said to us last term when she caught us outside."

"So what did you do?"

"I went down to Hagrid's cottage – I figured he'd probably let me into the castle without telling anyone. But he wasn't there – I think he'd gone to Hogsmeade. Anyway, I was cold, even though I had my cloak on. And I could see there was a big pile of straw in that lean-to round the back of the cottage, so I climbed in there to wait for him to come back, but I fell asleep. I didn't wake up till the next morning. He found me there when he went out to get some firewood."

"Did he let you in the castle?"

"Oh yes, he was really nice about it! First, he made me some tea, 'cause I was just about frozen by then, even in among all that straw. Oh, he's got a wolf in his cabin that's going to have cubs – he said we could both go and see them after they're born. Then he let me back into the castle. No-one else in our dormitory stayed, so no-one had really missed me." She sighed. "Apart from that, it was rather boring. Sev was sulking in the Slytherin dungeon, so I went out and climbed pine trees. I only fell out of one!"

The two girls went straight through the Gryffindor common room, and up to the dormitory.

"Quick, before the others come up – have you figured out how to do the spell?" Solstice asked eagerly. Lily nodded.

"I think I could do it with anything light enough. I couldn't practice it at home of course... let me try it." She pointed her wand at a quill lying on Solstice's bedside table. "_Proprietas Insisto!_" The quill rose into the air and floated over to Solstice, hovering above her dark hair.

Solstice took a few steps, and the quill floated after her, keeping position above her head, but when Solstice tried to catch it, it moved abruptly upwards, staying just out of her reach. Solstice grinned delightedly. "Perfect! You're sure the spell makes things go to the right person?"

"Pretty sure. We'll know for certain..."

"Shhh! The others are coming up!" Solstice hissed, and Lily finished in a whisper, "...a week from Saturday!"

* * *

James Potter leaned back in the armchair, propped his booted feet on the table, and grinned at his friends. He'd just got back from Quidditch practice, and was describing his exploits in the air, still dressed in his Quidditch robes. "You should have seen it! Fifty feet in an almost-vertical dive, I caught the snitch and pulled out of the dive just inches from the ground." He laced his fingers behind his head, enjoying the rapt attention of his audience. "Too bad it was just practice," he continued. "If I could just do something like that in the match tomorrow, it'd wipe those smug grins off the Slytherins. Just because they beat Ravenclaw by 400 points in October..."

At a nearby table Lily and Solstice, ostensibly hard at work on their Potions homework, exchanged grins. They were also looking forward to tomorrow's match with considerable anticipation, but for a very different reason.

"_Oy_, Evans!"

At James's shout, Lily glanced at Solstice, frowning slightly, but answered curtly, "What?"

"Going to watch me in the match tomorrow?" He twisted around to look at her, smirking.

Lily shrugged. "Only if there's nothing better to do," she replied offhandedly. She bent her head over her essay. She was careful not to catch Solstice's eye, but she knew that the other girl was also hiding a grin.

* * *

Saturday morning was clear and sunny, but bitingly-cold. Traces of snow lay along the edge of the path out to the Quidditch pitch; the students were bundled in scarves and gloves, and many had the hoods of their winter cloaks pulled up. For Solstice it was no problem to conceal a small bundle under her cloak as she and Lily took their place in a back corner of the Gryffindor stand. They looked around, noting the position of the Marauders right at the front. James, of course, was not with them; by now, he and the rest of the two teams would be waiting anxiously for the moment to walk out onto the pitch and mount their brooms.

The two girls watched with suppressed excitement as more students and teachers arrived. There were a lot of Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs - those two houses weren't involved in the match that day, but it was well known that the long-standing and bitter rivalry between Gryffindor and Slytherin made for tense and spectacular matches. Finally, the two teams emerged, to roars from the crowd. The snitch was released, the players kicked off from the ground, and the match was underway.

"Give it five minutes," Lily murmured. "We want to make sure that everyone's attention is on the game..."

Those five minutes seemed endless, but finally Solstice drew the bundle from beneath her cloak. In her hands were the four pairs of underwear that she and Lily had liberated and hidden in Solstice's trunk the previous term. One at a time, she held out the garments to Lily, who pointed her wand at them, muttering, "Proprietas Insisto!" each time.

Solstice, keeping a firm grip on them, grinned as she felt them tugging at her hands. "They want to go!" she told Lily.

"Okay... just a few more seconds..." Gryffindor scored, excitement rippled through the crowd, and Lily said, "Okay – now!" Solstice opened her hands, and the bewitched underpants shot straight up in the air before each was pulled, as if by an invisible magnet, towards the boy that owned them.

At first, Remus ignored the flicker of white that caught the edge of his field of vision, concentrating as he was on watching the match. Behind him, there was a sudden murmur. It was different from the excited chatter that had been ringing in his ears, and he glanced back. To his surprise, a number of students seemed to be ignoring the play around the goal posts, and looking at something else – something right above him... puzzled, he looked up.

It took a few seconds to sink in that the object floating above his head, just out of his reach, was a pair of underpants... _his_ underpants, he realized with shock. Instinctively, he made a grab for them, finding that they bobbed upwards, remaining just beyond the reach of his fingertips.

On either side of him, Sirius and Peter turned their heads, wondering why Remus had started leaping repeatedly into the air, and making wild lunges with both arms. As they did so, each realized that they were similarly afflicted. It briefly occurred to Remus to be glad that at least his appeared to be clean! Peter, on the other hand, was trying in vain to capture a pair of pants that were, grey, wrinkled and sagging.

On the other side of Remus, Sirius was staring dumbfounded at the vivid pink boxer shorts that floated lazily above him. For a few seemingly-endless seconds, all he could do was gaze at them in disbelief. Then as it sank in what was happening, he began to laugh. His first few lunges at the shorts were half-hearted, then he hurled himself upwards, feeling his fingertips brush the fabric, but even as his hand tried to close on the shorts, he knew that he'd jumped too far forward, and he collided with the railing at the front of the stands. For a second, he found himself staring down at the ground far below, tilting dangerously over the rail. Then someone – he never knew who – grabbed the back of his cloak, and pulled him back.

Watching from the back, Solstice and Lily gasped as it appeared that Sirius was about to fall right out of the stand; then he was back safely on his feet, trying to grab the shorts again, and roaring with laughter.

The girls exchanged grins – somehow, it wasn't surprising that Sirius was enjoying the situation. The other two boys were flushed with exertion and varying degrees of embarrassment.

Then Lily grabbed Solstice's arm and pointed. "Look!"

It was a sight they would treasure. James Potter, resplendent in his gold and crimson Quidditch robes, tearing at top speed across the pitch with a pair of pale blue Y-fronts in hot pursuit. Totally oblivious to the situation, he lost sight of the snitch he'd been chasing, and finally noticed that the excited cheering all around him was changing to laughter. Frowning, he pulled up out of the dive, and swung around sharply to see what was going on.

The Y-fronts hit him in the face, wrapping themselves around his head. Thinking at first that some kind of bird – or possibly a bat – had attacked him, he swiped wildly, rocking dangerously on his broom. He clutched at the handle with both hands, as the pants untangled themselves and shot upwards, bobbing gently a few feet above his head. He made a grab at them, but as had happened to the other boys, they darted away from his hand, staying just out of reach. James chased the pants halfway across the pitch before realizing the futility of the maneuver.

Now, however, he was close enough to the Gryffindor stand to see the three other Marauders each with a garment floating elusively above them. Suddenly it clicked – the memory of the night their clothes vanished from the bathroom, and Peter's predicament the next morning when he found his only pair of underpants was missing. Whoever had carried out the sabotage of the bath must have been planning this sequel for weeks, and come up with a spell to make the pants go after their owners without getting close enough to be caught.

Despite the embarrassment of his underwear being on public display, James grinned. He had to admit that it was a great prank – one he would have been pleased to play himself. He scanned the stands, hoping for some clue as to who had bewitched the underwear.

Noting the expression of realization on James's face, Lily waited until the boy was looking in the opposite direction, then flicked her wand unobtrusively, muttering, "Finite Incantatum!"

The four pairs of underpants fell out of the sky simultaneously. Peter's landed on his head, falling over his eyes. James, as he had hoped, had the opportunity to make a spectacular diving catch – and although he would have preferred it to be the snitch, he had enough presence of mind to wave the Y-fronts triumphantly above his head before stuffing them into his pocket.

The crowd roared in appreciation, and more than one person reflected that at least Potter was taking the joke against him with good grace. It was Sirius, however, who got the biggest cheer; retrieving his outrageous pink boxers at last, he placed one hand over his heart, bowed theatrically to the Third Year girl on his right, and with a flourish, presented her with the shorts. Blushing wildly, she felt forced to accept this unexpected gift. Some of these Second Year boys, she found herself thinking, definitely had style! As the crowd began to calm down, and it seemed likely that Quidditch might actually break out again, she glanced sideways and smiled shyly at Sirius.

Exhilarated by all the attention, Sirius took a chance, and leaned over to murmur in her ear. Blushing even more, she giggled and nodded, and Sirius scooted along the bench to sit closer to her.

In back row, Lily turned to Solstice in disbelief.

"Did he just...?"

Solstice looked at Sirius, now sneaking an arm around the girl, and nodded. "Yeah! He just asked her out!"

Lily stared open-mouthed, then shook her head and unwillingly began to laugh.

"Trust Sirius Black to make the most of being pranked!"


	7. A Step Behind

**THIRD YEAR – SEPTEMBER**

Platform 9 ¾ was crowded with the usual mix of excited students, anxious parents, luggage, owls and steam, as the Hogwarts Express prepared for the long journey north.

The four Marauders were standing in a group, everyone talking at once as they discussed the summer holidays that had just ended. All had grown noticeably, but Remus had outdone them all. Still as thin as ever, with his customary faint air of exhaustion, he now towered over his friends, and moved with the awkwardness that often accompanied a sudden growth spurt. His one consolation was that when his voice broke, it had done so almost overnight, so that he was at least spared the disconcerting croaks, squeaks and changes of pitch that his friends were enduring. Suddenly, James broke off in the middle of a joke, and gazed down the platform. The other boys turned to look in the same direction.

Lily Evans was standing a short distance away, talking to Snape. She had obviously done her own share of growing over the summer. She was taller, more shapely, and her manner was outgoing and confident. She shook her long, gleaming chestnut hair back from her face and turned, still laughing, to get on the train. Remus nudged Sirius and nodded towards James, who was now oblivious to his friends, a bemused expression on his face as he watched Lily disappear onto the train. Sirius grinned and said, "Smitten, that's what he is."

"Who wouldn't be?" James murmured. Suddenly he snapped out of his daze. "Come on, we'll get in the same compartment."

As they pushed open the sliding door and crowded in from the corridor, Lily glanced up and frowned with annoyance, but her attention was mostly on the wicker basket that Solstice held. In contrast with her classmates, Solstice hardly seemed to have grown at all, and looked much as she had done on the night she was sorted. She could easily have been mistaken for a First Year.

Paying no attention to the boys, she unlatched the door of the basket, reached in and gently drew out a bundle of fluffy, greyish-white feathers. As she placed it on her lap, it suddenly stretched out scrawny legs and claws, flapped rudimentary wings, and snapped its long, pinkish beak. It blinked, its round black eyes peering from the heart-shaped ruff that surrounded its face.

"What the hell is that?" Sirius demanded, gazing at the bizarre-looking creature in fascination.

Solstice scowled at him. "It's a baby barn owl, of course!"

"Where did you get it?" Lily asked, watching as the bird took a few wobbly steps. It clicked its beak again, looking up at Solstice, who fished a damp, blood-stained package from her pocket. She unwrapped the gory parcel, revealing chunks of raw liver, picked up a piece and fed it to the owlet.

"I found the nest," she explained. "Someone had shot the mother, and I rescued the eggs. Three of them hatched, but only this chick survived." She rubbed the bird's head with a finger, and it squawked softly, settling down in her lap, so that its feathers covered its skinny claws.

"It thinks you're its girlfriend," James said jeeringly.

"No, actually it thinks I'm its mother!"

The boys shouted with laughter, and the owl screeched in alarm. Sirius reached out and poked at the bird. It promptly hurled itself onto its back, striking out with its feet and hissing loudly. Naturally, this only increased the Marauders' amusement, and even Lily had to laugh at the ridiculous sight.

Solstice gathered the screeching bundle of feathers to her chest, and gently covered it with her cloak. "That's what barn owls do when they're scared," she explained. "It won't be so funny when it has proper talons."

"What do you mean – it thinks you're its mother?" Lily demanded.

"I was the first thing it saw when it hatched – it's called imprinting. Normally they imprint on their mother. This one imprinted on me." The owl screamed again, slightly muffled under the cloak, and Lily frowned.

"You're not – um – planning on keeping it in the dormitory, are you?" she asked. "It'll keep us awake all night!"

Solstice grinned. "Of course not. It needs feeding during the day, so I'm going to ask Hagrid if he'll help me with it." Lily looked extremely relieved.

"What's its name?" Remus asked.

"I was thinking of Tyto – that's the genus it belongs to, so..."

Sirius laughed derisively. "Better call it Hoot, so it remembers it's an owl!"

There was more laughter, but Remus smiled at Solstice sympathetically. She shrugged. "For your information, barn owls don't hoot!" She curled her legs up under her, and opened the book lying on the seat beside her. She flipped through it until she found a page depicting various owls in flight, and began to read. Lily glanced at her, then pulled a magazine from the pocket of her robe. Both girls ignored the bantering chatter of the Marauders who were now discussing Gryffindor's chances in that year's Quidditch Cup.

* * *

Sitting at the Gryffindor table before dinner that night, watching as the latest batch of First Years filed in nervously, Lily turned to Solstice and asked, "Remember when we were sorted? How come they called you last? Your last name begins with an 'F' so you should have been called right after me."

"It's because I'm an Elemental. They weren't sure how long it would take to sort me. There was a girl last century who sat for half an hour before the Hat made up its mind. Professor McGonagall said I should go last, so if the same thing happened with me, at least everyone else wouldn't be standing around waiting."

During dinner, Solstice and Lily talked mostly to each other, catching up on all their holiday news, but as they waited in the queue to get into the Common Room, one of their dormitory mates caught Lily's arm. "Did you get your Hogsmeade permission signed? I can't wait to visit Gladrags Wizard Wear."

"Yes, Aralia, I've got my permission slip. When's the first visit?"

"It's usually around Halloween. My mother gave me enough Galleons for a set of dress robes. She says I'm old enough to choose my own now."

Lily looked doubtful. "I don't expect I'll be able to afford much – but it'll be fun to look all the same. Solstice, did you get permission?"

"Yes. My foster parents signed it – even though they're not really my guardians any more..."

"Why not?"

"They decided they couldn't foster me any more." Solstice grinned. "They had a bunch of reasons, but I think the owl sort of decided them. So I'll have a new family next summer. Anyway, they signed the form for me. But I don't want to waste time in a dress shop..."

Aralia glanced at her. "I suppose all you're interested in is the sweet shop," she said, a faintly scornful edge to her voice.

"Why would I be?" Solstice looked surprised. "I don't like sweet stuff. What I want to see is that shack at the end of the village. I heard one of the Fifth Years say that it's haunted."

"Haunted!" The scornful tone was unmistakeable now. "There are lots of haunted houses. Why would you want to go and stare at one?" Aralia tossed her fair, curly hair back from her face and climbed through the portrait hole.

Once they were inside the common room, Lily pulled Solstice aside. "You know what you said about that shack? Maybe it's got something to do with what we heard last year – you know, the howls, when we were out in the grounds that night."

Solstice nodded. "That's what I thought. I don't know how close we'll be able to get – it's fenced off. It was only build a few years ago, but it's already starting to fall down, so it could be dangerous. That's what I heard, anyway. But we might see something..."

"Lily!" Aralia called from the steps leading to the dormitories. "Come upstairs – my mother gave me my own make-up case for my birthday last month, and she said I could bring it to school. I want to show it to you."

"All right." Lily started towards her, then glanced back at Solstice. "Aren't you coming?"

"Um – no, I want to finish the chapter on how owls learn to fly."

Solstice seemed a little uncertain, and Lily urged, "Come on – don't you want to see what Aralia's mum gave her?"

"No – not really."

Lily looked at her friend curiously for a moment, then said, "Well – all right then. I'll see you later."

She headed off to the dormitory, leaving Solstice to curl up at one end of a shabby sofa, her book in her hands. But although she flipped over a page occasionally, she didn't take in much of what she read. Now and then, she glanced up at the stairs to the dormitory, looking puzzled. Going up to bed later, she found that Aralia had encouraged Lily to try on some of her make-up.

"What do you think? Does it look good?" Lily asked enthusiastically.

Solstice gazed at her silently, her expression slightly awestruck. "You look – so grown up!" she said at last.

"Thanks! But I'd better go and wash it off before I go to bed..." She and Aralia went into the bathroom, and Solstice could hear them chattering as they got ready for bed. Solstice pulled on her nightgown and climbed into bed. She felt a bit put-out by Lily's new interest in make-up and clothes, but she wasn't really sure why it made her feel uncomfortable. She lay down, pulling her sheet and light blanket around her shoulders, then mentally shrugged. There would be plenty of time to talk to Lily later, she told herself.

But somehow, as they settled back into school routine over the next few weeks, there didn't seem to be as much time to talk as in the past. Solstice was busy with her owl, and had discovered that she had a way with the animals – of varying size and ferocity – that Hagrid had in and around his cottage, so after taking care of the baby owl, she often spent extra time there, helping out, or just asking questions. During the evenings, although she and Lily still did their homework together, they were often interrupted by Aralia, or the other two girls, Sophie and Mary, who shared their dormitory.

* * *

Halloween came at last, and the Third Years set out excitedly on their first trip to Hogsmeade. Solstice wasn't too pleased to find that Aralia, Mary and Sophie joined her and Lily as they walked along the main street of the village. Solstice paused at the turn-off to the shack she had told Lily about, but Lily said, "Let's look at the shops first."

"Well – all right. I need to go to Dervish and Banges – I have to get some new balance scales and a cauldron..."

Lily giggled. During the last Potions lesson, Solstice had misread the instructions in her text book, with the result that her cauldron sent up a cloud of brilliant blue smoke and began to melt. Jumping back from the hissing mess that spilled onto the floor, she accidentally dropped her balance scales, which fell into the remains of the cauldron. Solstice had spent an hour after class cleaning up the damage, and now needed to replace the two pieces of equipment, which were now a single shapeless lump of melted metal.

Dervish and Banges proved fascinating, and after purchasing her new cauldron and scales, Solstice spent some time looking at the other items on offer. Many of them were useless to her variety of magic – even if she had been able to afford anything else – but she was intrigued nonetheless.

After about ten minutes, Aralia said, "Let's go to Gladrags. I want to try on those robes they've got in the window."

"Come on, Solstice!" Lily called, following Aralia, but Solstice said distractedly, "I'll catch up..."

The other girls filed out, and as the door swung shut, Solstice heard Aralia say, "We don't need a kid tagging along anyway..."

Solstice's face burned, and she turned angrily back to the crystal globe she had been examining.

Outside, Lily faced Aralia indignantly. "That wasn't nice! And anyway, her birthday's in June, and yours is in August, so she's actually older than you!"

Aralia shrugged. "She may be older, but I'm much more mature than her. I don't know why you let her hang around you."

"She doesn't hang around me – she's my friend!" Lily exclaimed heatedly.

"Well anyway," Sophie put in hurriedly, "she didn't want to go to Gladrags. So let's not argue about it." Lily glanced back at the shop they had just left. Solstice had seemed quite happy looking around Dervish and Banges, and she probably hadn't heard Aralia's snide comment anyway... She followed the other girls through the door of the clothier's. She hadn't given it much thought before, but now she was here, it wouldn't hurt to try on the outfit that Aralia was pointing out to her.

Finally emerging from the shop next door, Solstice paused, scowling at the door of the clothes shop. If the other girls didn't want a 'kid' around, she would just explore Hogsmeade on her own. Just down the street, she saw the four Marauders heading towards Zonkos. They had evidently just left Honeydukes, and were sampling the sweets they had bought. Solstice had been thinking of taking a look at Zonkos, but now changed her mind, and headed down the main street.

The shack was a disappointment. As she had been told, it was fenced off, and despite looking more dilapidated than one might expect for a building only a few years old, there was really nothing special about it. The path that ran past the shack ended at the railway line just ahead, and on the other side of the track the trees clustered thickly on the slope that ran down to the lake. She crossed over the railway track, and shifted her new cauldron awkwardly under her arm. Pausing at the edge of the woods, she tucked the cauldron under a thorny bush, dropped the new scales inside, and pulled some fronds of bracken across to hide it from view. Without another glance back at the village, she plunged in among the trees.

Solstice rejoined Lily and the other girls as they headed back towards Hogwarts at the end of the morning. She was somewhat dishevelled, and had several twiggy branches tucked into her new cauldron. "I was exploring the woods on the other side of the railway line," she explained in answer to Lily's query. She indicated the twigs. "There were some trees I didn't recognize, so I brought back samples - Professor Greenwood will probably be able to tell me what they are."

"Who cares what they are. Trees are trees," Aralia drawled.

"Oh, Solstice is obsessed with trees," Lily exclaimed. She had meant it as a gentle tease, but to her surprise, Solstice scowled and flushed darkly red. Shifting her cauldron in her arms, she broke into a run, quickly outdistancing the others, and ignoring Lily's shout of, "Solstice, wait - I didn't mean..."

"Oh, let her go, if she's such a baby she can't take a joke." Aralia's tone was dismissive.

"She's not a baby!" Lily snapped. "Why are you always so mean about her?"

"I'm not mean, I just don't have time for little kids."

"Well she's my friend, so stop saying things like that!"

At lunch, Solstice seemed to have cooled off a little, and talked quite happily about the progress that her owlet was making. But as they were leaving the Great Hall, she said, "Come and see him this afternoon. He really looks like an owl now, and I think he'll learn to fly soon."

Lily stopped in the hallway, looking dismayed. "Oh, Solstice - I can't. I'm sorry, but I already promised Aralia that I'd..."

Solstice's face darkened. "Fine! If you'd rather mess around with make-up..."

"It's not that -" Actually, Lily would have much rather gone to visit the owl, but she'd already promised. "It's just that she asked me first and..."

"Forget it! It doesn't matter," Solstice snapped. She continued along the hall and up the stairs to the Common Room in stormy silence. Once there, she flung herself into an armchair, picked up the nearest book, and pretended to become absorbed in it.

"Come on, Lily!" Aralia sounded smug as she called from the stairs. Lily hesitated. "Well..."

"It's okay," Solstice muttered, not looking up. All the anger seemed to have drained out of her, and her voice was subdued as she said, "If you promised..."

"I did. I'm sorry." Lily turned towards the stairs.

Remus Lupin, waiting by the portrait hole, while James fetched his broomstick, had overheard the exchange. He could see Lily's point in sticking to her original promise, but he suddenly felt sorry for the younger girl. Impulsively he called out, "Hey Solstice! Come and watch the Quidditch practice this afternoon."

Solstice looked up at him, startled, but after a moment she said, "Okay - I'll go and get my cloak."

Once outside, Solstice's mood lightened a little, and she told Remus about her owl. "Why don't you fetch him?" Remus suggested.

"Would it be okay - to take him to the Quidditch practice, I mean?"

Remus shrugged. "I don't see why not. Hey, James!" he shouted to his friend a short distance ahead. "We'll be there in a few minutes - we just have to fetch something first."

Remus was surprised by the change in the baby owl. It now had proper feathers, with just a few traces of baby down remaining, and it was clearly recognizable as a barn owl. As he and Solstice headed for the Quidditch pitch, he noticed how fond she seemed of it - and how the bird responded to her. As soon as they were seated in the stands, Solstice put the owl down beside her and it began to walk solemnly along the wooden bench. As the players kicked off from the ground, Remus asked, "Do you know much about Quidditch?"

"Not really. I've watched a few matches, so I know the basic rules, but that's about it. I mean, why do they do that?" she asked, watching the team practice a tricky manoeuvre. Remus plunged into an explanation, continuing his commentary as Solstice asked further questions.

After a while, Peter and Sirius joined them, and having listened to Remus for a few minutes, Sirius said, "Professor Lupin - Quidditch instructor!"

Remus grinned, but before he could reply, Sirius noticed the owl. "How's your feather duster?" he asked teasingly.

"He's fine - he can almost fly," Solstice told him. Somehow, his teasing didn't bother her the same way Lily's unfortunate remark that morning had done.

Sirius whistled at the bird. "Hey, Hoot! C'm'ere Hoot!" he called.

"His name's _Tyto_!" Solstice insisted, but Sirius just grinned infuriatingly.

"Nah, Hoot's a much better name. Hey, Hoot!" The bird began to sidle towards him, and Sirius laughed. "Look, he knows his name."

Solstice grinned unwillingly. Sirius stood up and reached towards the owl. It screeched, snapping at him, flapped its wings - and flew a dozen feet to the end of the bench. Solstice leapt to her feet excitedly, shouting, "He flew! Did you see? He actually flew!"

"Am I good or what?" Sirius bragged. "I made Hoot fly - now you have to call him Hoot, in my honour!" He was teasing her again, but Solstice suddenly nodded, laughing.

"Okay - I'll call him Hoot! Hoot, come here!"

As if on cue, Hoot ruffled his feathers, and flew directly to her, landing clumsily on her shoulder. One of his claws raked her accidentally, leaving a livid red scratch down her cheek, but she was too pleased with her pet's accomplishment to notice.

* * *

It was dark by the time Solstice returned Hoot to Hagrid's care, and followed the Marauders back to the castle. Her earlier bad temper was forgotten, and she went into the Great Hall, looking for Lily. She was eager to tell her about Hoot's new skill, but she found her sitting with a group of Third and Fourth year girls. Her high spirits evaporated immediately, and even as Lily looked up and called to her that she had saved a space, Solstice turned away, trying hide her disappointment, and the sudden unexpected surge of resentment.

Just as he had done earlier that afternoon, Remus noticed Solstice's downcast expression. As she passed, he caught her arm. "Plenty of space here," he told her, gently pulling her towards the bench. She returned his smile fleetingly, but said nothing as she slid into the space he indicated.

In the dormitory that night, Lily had hoped to get a few minutes alone to talk to her friend, but as happened so often these days, Aralia had monopolized her attention. She liked Aralia, and they had some interests in common, but she much preferred Solstice's company. The problem was, Solstice had been so touchy recently, and Lily wasn't really sure why. She'd never minded before if Lily was friendly with others - and Lily got on well with most people. But Aralia seemed to enjoy belittling Solstice, and had been unrepentant when Lily tackled her about it. This morning in Hogsmeade was a good example. Lily was at a loss to know what to do, beyond telling Aralia to stop teasing Solstice.

Lying in the darkness, listening to the other girls' breathing, a sudden thought struck her. Maybe Solstice was upset about something else - hadn't she started to tell Lily about having new foster parents? Perhaps she was unhappy about that... as recently as a few weeks ago, Lily would not have hesitated to ask Solstice about it, and see if there was something she could do to help; she could, at least, have offered a sympathetic ear. But the other girl's mood was so unpredictable now that Lily wasn't sure if that was the best approach. She didn't want to upset Solstice even more.

Lily lay for a while, trying to decide the best way to help her friend. After a while, she slipped out of bed and went to sit in the window alcove. It was raining hard, and Lily's mind wandered back to the start of the previous spring term, when she'd had to walk from the station in a downpour, and had barely noticed the discomfort because she had been busy talking to Professor Greenwood. Lily sat up straight, smiling with relief. Of course - she could talk to Professor Greenwood, and see if he knew what was really bothering Solstice. Maybe he would have some idea of how Lily could help her. Feeling much better, she got up from the window and went back to bed.

* * *

Monday's weather was as wet as it had been on Saturday night and all through Sunday. Solstice was still sulking. In a fit of temper she had thrown her twig samples on the fire in the Common Room, and was now regretting it, as she really had been interested in finding out what they were.

She was supposed to be writing an essay on the formation of storms; true weather magic - as opposed to the freak lightning she had summoned during her first term at school - involved working with the natural weather processes, so she needed to understand exactly how they worked. When she had started studying it at the beginning of term, she had found it fascinating. But today, she felt disinclined to settle to any work, and she fidgeted, and doodled on the margin of her parchment.

Professor Greenwood was working at his own desk, but he had glanced at Solstice several times, fully aware that she wasn't doing any work. After a while, he said, "How's the essay coming?"

Solstice jumped slightly. "Fine," she mumbled. "I'm - um - thinking..."

"Have you actually written anything?" Professor Greenwood asked mildly.

Solstice scowled. "I _said_, I'm _thinking_," she snapped. There was silence. Professor Greenwood looked at her steadily, and Solstice stared at her parchment, her cheeks burning, waiting for the explosion.

Greenwood pushed his quill and parchment aside, and stood up. "Get your cloak," he said gently.

Solstice looked up at him, startled. "What?"

"Put your cloak on. I think we could both do with some fresh air."

"But - it's pouring..."

Greenwood's mouth quirked. "I don't think we'll melt," he assured her.

Within a few minutes of going outside, Solstice started to feel better, despite the weather. She found the heavy rain and high winds quite exhilarating. They walked in silence for a while, heading along the shore of the Black lake. Eventually, Greenwood asked, "So what's going on?" Solstice looked up at him, and he continued, "You haven't been yourself lately. You've been out of sorts for weeks, your work has been poor. And I think this is the first time you've ever been rude to me."

Solstice blushed.

"So what's bothering you?" he prompted. She looked away uncomfortably, and Greenwood continued, "I know there's something. Did you quarrel with someone?" Noting the sharp glance she gave him, he went on, "Was it with one of your friends?"

"I _thought_ Lily was my friend, but now she's _not_!" Solstice burst out.

"She's not?" Greenwood's tone was conversational, and he was careful to keep any note of scepticism out of his voice.

"No! Well, she's always going around with the other girls now, and she thinks I'm a baby!"

"She said that?"

"Yes - no. Well, not really, but that's what she thinks."

Greenwood watched her face, seeing the sudden uncertainty in her expression. "Tell me what she said."

"Well, she - it was - I mean..." Solstice fumbled with her words. Now that she was trying to tell someone else about it, she was no longer sure exactly what had been said.

"Did she actually call you a baby?"

"No. But Aralia did. She said I was a little kid."

"And what did Lily say to that? Did she agree?"

"Um - I'm not - I didn't hear what she said. They were going out of the shop, and the door closed."

"I see. Don't you think you're being unfair to Lily?" Greenwood suggested gently. "You didn't hear her agree, did you."

"Well, no." Solstice flushed. "But she's always hanging round with Aralia now. They do things together. They play with make-up and stuff."

"Did they say you couldn't join them?" Greenwood asked.

"No, but Aralia never asks me, just Lily."

"So Lily has never said that you're not welcome?"

"No." Solstice looked down, suddenly feeling a wave of shame. "Lily usually asks me to join in. But I don't."

"Why not?"

Solstice faced him, and he could see the misery and confusion in her face. "I don't know. Aralia _is_ mean to me. Whatever I say, she sneers, and she acts like she's grown up."

"But Lily doesn't?"

Solstice shook her head unhappily. "Not in a nasty way. But she's _different _this year. We always used to like all the same things, and we did everything together. But suddenly she likes different things."

"Things like make-up and hairstyles and clothes?" Greenwood suggested.

Solstice frowned, surprised. "Yes! All those things!"

Greenwood gazed out across the rain-swept lake. He thought he knew what the problem was, but he would have to explain it carefully to Solstice. "Lily's grown quite a bit, hasn't she?"

Solstice seemed baffled by his question. "I suppose so. I mean, she's taller and - and things like that..."

"But you're not."

"No." Solstice continued to look puzzled, and eventually he continued, choosing his words with care.

"Perhaps the real problem is that Lily is growing up, but you aren't, yet. And you're feeling as if she's left you behind." When Solstice nodded, Greenwood went on, "It's not really unusual. Friends don't always grow up at the same time. One of them starts to grow up first, and they become interested in new things. Maybe they wonder why the other person isn't interested too. And the one who hasn't started growing yet - or is just slower - feels that their friend isn't as much fun any more, and they wonder if they've stopped being friends."

"And - do they stop being friends?" Solstice asked hesitantly.

"Sometimes. But if they're really good friends, they can usually find a way to stay friends."

Solstice sighed. "But why aren't I growing? Lily's only five months older than me - and I'm older than Aralia, and she's grown a lot."

"Everyone grows at a different rate. In your case, it has a lot to do with being Elemental - we tend to reach adolescence later than average. I didn't start growing until Fourth Year. I was the smallest in my class that September, and some of the other kids teased me about it. But by the end of Fourth Year, I was the tallest in the year!"

"I wish I could start growing now. I hate being the smallest..."

Greenwood glanced at her, consideringly. "Solstice, you may find that you never grow as tall as most girls in your year." When Solstice's face fell, he added, "I'm not trying to make you unhappy. But you've always been small for your age, and your bone structure is very fine. If your parents were small, you may take after them. But even if that's the case - well, it's not necessarily such a bad thing. And you'll probably find that you feel differently about it, when you're a little more mature. You'll start to understand people better, and you'll have more self-control - and both of those will help you, not just with getting along with your friends - they'll help with your magic, too."

Solstice looked a little more hopeful. "How will it help my magic?"

"You'll be able to control your power better, and understand how it works. And you'll find that you develop new abilities, magic that you don't have as a child. So we'll be able to start studying things like moon magic and fire spells."

"And - will I start to like the things that Lily likes now?"

"Possibly - but not necessarily. But you'll have your own new interests, and even if they're not the same as Lily's, and you don't do as much together as before, you can still be just as good friends as you always have been."

Solstice nodded, thinking all this over. "But Professor - _when_ will I start growing up?"

He smiled at her. "I can't say. But once you do start, you'll probably find that its happens quickly, and you'll catch up fast."

"Is that an Elemental thing too?"

"Partly. But don't worry about it - it doesn't help."

Solstice nodded, then her expression clouded again. "What is it?" Greenwood prompted.

"Well - I think I've been mean to Lily lately. What if she doesn't want to be my friend because of that?"

"I don't think Lily's like that. If you make an effort not to get upset with her, I think Lily will realize that you still want to be friends."

"Should I - should I apologize to her?"

"If you like. If it's difficult at first, just show her you're sorry by not taking offence when she has new interests, or is friendly with other people." He studied her face for a moment, then smiled again. "Feel better about it all now? You already look happier."

"Yes. Thank you, Professor. And - I'm sorry I was rude to you."

"Then we won't worry about that any more." He slicked his wet hair back from his forehead, and grinned. "So - now that we've spent all this time outside, do you think you can bear to start writing about what causes this sort of weather?"

Solstice nodded, returning his grin, as they began to head back towards the castle.

* * *

After dinner that evening, Professor Greenwood was unwinding in his study, reading in front of a crackling fire, when a hesitant knock sounded on the door. "Come in," he called. The door opened and Lily stood in the doorway, looking uncertain. Greenwood put his book aside and stood up. "What can I do for you this evening, Lily?" he asked.

"Could I talk to you about something, Professor?"

"Certainly. Come in and sit down." Lily took the second chair beside the fire, and Greenwood resumed his own seat. "So - what would you like to talk about?"

"Solstice."

Greenwood nodded, catching back his smile just in time. "All right. Tell me what's on your mind."

Lily hesitated for a moment, not sure how to begin. "Well, I'm worried about her. She's been acting strangely, and I think she's unhappy about something. Did you know that she's going to have new foster parents?"

"Yes, she mentioned it, but she didn't seem to mind. Has she said something to you that makes you think she's miserable about it?"

"I'm not sure. She only mentioned it once, and she didn't say that she was upset about it. But she just hasn't been the same this term. She snaps at me, and she gets angry about things that wouldn't have bothered her before. There must be something wrong, and I want to help if I can but I just don't know how."

Greenwood regarded Lily seriously for a moment. He was inclined to think that the change of behaviour Lily described was a result of the problems Solstice had talked about earlier that afternoon. "Lily, you may be right about the foster parents. But I know that something else has been worrying her, because she told me about it today."

"What is it?"

"She's unhappy because she's not growing up as fast as she thinks she should. She feels as if she's getting left behind."

"Left behind?" Lily looked perplexed.

"Yes. She sees that you have some new interests, and she's worried that you don't want to be friends with her any more."

"But - I _do_ want to be friends! I keep asking her to join in."

"But there's usually another girl around - Aralia? Just between you and me, I think Solstice feels jealous of her."

Lily looked incredulous. "Jealous? But I like Solstice _much_ more than Aralia! Aralia is interested in clothes and things, and sometimes I like talking about that too, but not all the time. There are lots of things I still like that Solstice is interested in too."

Greenwood nodded, but said, "Solstice feels that Aralia has been unkind to her. Is that true?"

Lily flushed miserably. "Yes. But I've told Aralia to stop being mean!"

"Does Solstice know that?"

"Um - I don't know. Surely she doesn't think I agree with what Aralia says?"

"I'm afraid that's what she's been thinking. But... " he held up his hand as Lily started to object. "I think she's started to realize that she's wrong. The problem is that she doesn't have the maturity to take a step back and ask herself if she's been taking things the wrong way, so she needed help to do that. I think she might be a bit jealous of you, too, because you're growing up and she isn't."

"Well - I can't help that I'm growing up!" Lily protested, and Greenwood smiled as he replied, "No, I know. Just as she can't help that she isn't. But you have the advantage of having more maturity, and you can try to see her side of it. Suppose it was the other way around? Suppose she was growing up, and you weren't? You'd probably be unhappy if you thought she wasn't interested in the things you used to do together."

Lily nodded, thoughtfully. "Yes - I would." She looked up at Greenwood. "What should I do? Should I tell her that I'm sorry?"

"You could tell her that you didn't realize that she felt left out."

"What about Aralia?"

"You've already told Aralia that you don't like the way she treats Solstice. That's a good start. You can still be friends with her."

"But she keeps trying to get me to do things with her instead of with Solstice."

"Then you must be firm. You don't have to be unkind to Aralia, just make sure she understands that you won't let her push Solstice out of the picture."

Lily was silent for a few minutes, thinking over the new perspective on the problem, then she suddenly burst out, "It's all been so complicated this term!"

Greenwood nodded sympathetically. "Growing up isn't easy. But it gets less difficult as you go along, and start figuring out what works to solve the problems."

Lily stood up. "Thank you, Professor. I was so confused about what was wrong with Solstice, but I think I understand now."

"That's good." He stood up and opened the door for her. "Goodnight, Lily."

She smiled up at him. "Goodnight!"

After he closed the door, Greenwood took a bottle from the cupboard and poured out a small firewhisky. He sat back down by the fire, staring into the flames for a while. Although he was fairly sure that Solstice was not fretting about her new foster parents, it might be as well to talk to her about it in the next day or two, just to be certain. He leaned back in his armchair, feeling drained, then he suddenly grinned to himself, and took a gulp of firewhisky. A couple of sessions dealing with teenagers' growing pains was more exhausting that an entire week of teaching!

* * *

When she got back to the Common Room, Lily couldn't see Solstice; she normally spent part of the evening meditating, so Lily ran up the stairs to the dormitory, hoping to find her there alone. She was in luck. Solstice was alone in the room, sitting in the window alcove. There was a lighted candle beside her, but instead of meditating she was gazing out of the window.

Now that she had the opportunity to talk, Lily wasn't sure how to begin. She opened the drawer of her bedside cabinet, pretending to look for something; then she abruptly turned to her friend and blurted, "Solstice, I'm sorry Aralia's been mean to you!" at the same time as Solstice said, "Sorry I've been so cross lately."

They both paused, looking at each other, then Lily said, "I didn't realize that Aralia was upsetting you so much. And - I'm sorry I said that thing about you being obsessed with trees..."

"I know you weren't being unkind. I just - overreacted." Solstice blushed as she spoke.

Lily went to the window, moved the candle, and sat on the ledge beside Solstice. "I - um - I went to see Professor Greenwood just now. I was worried, because I didn't know why you were unhappy..."

Solstice nodded. "Yes, I talked to him about it too. He said that you have new interests because you're growing up faster than me, and I shouldn't be upset about that. I'm just slower – because I'm an Elemental - but I'll catch up."

"But I still want to do things with you. Aralia's okay, but these days all she wants to talk about is clothes and things like that. I don't mind it sometimes, but it gets boring after a while. And Solstice - I keep telling her not to be unkind to you."

Solstice smiled, looking a little ashamed of herself. "I should have known that. I just got upset, and I was so confused, and I couldn't figure it out myself, until I talked to Professor Greenwood."

"He's nice," Lily commented. "He doesn't treat us like kids - he just explains things really well. I - I didn't know you felt left out. I mean, I have asked you to join in, but..."

"I know. I was being silly - I suppose I was sulking. I thought you weren't interested in the things I like any more... Oh, Lily!" she exclaimed, suddenly remembering her news. "I never even told you - Hoot can fly now! He flew for the first time on Saturday."

"That's great!" Lily said, but she looked puzzled. "Hoot? Weren't you going to call him..."

"Yes, I was. But then Sirius Black scared him and made him fly, and he said I should call him Hoot in return for teaching him to fly! It is sort of funny to call him that when he doesn't hoot!"

"Sirius Black? How come you were with him? Oh - I'm not saying you shouldn't be friends with him. It's just that - I thought neither of us liked Potter and that crowd."

Solstice shrugged. "Remus is all right. He asked me to watch the Quidditch practice, and of course Black was there. You know, I think I might go and watch more practices..." Her face suddenly lit up. "Professor Greenwood was right! He said I'd find new interests of my own - and there's my owl, and now Quidditch!"

Lily nodded. "Yes - but it's okay for us to have different interests. We don't have to stop being friends. And maybe I could come and watch Quidditch with you sometimes!" She got up and went over to her bed, then stopped and turned back.

"Solstice - I thought at first that you were upset because you're going to have new foster parents. Is - is all that okay?"

Solstice looked faintly surprised. "Oh yes - I don't mind. When I go to a new family, it's fun exploring a different neighbourhood. I mean, I'm here at school most of the time, so it's not as if it makes a lot of difference. I'm used to living with different people every few years." She got up, snuffed out the candle, and went over to her own bed.

As she rummaged under her pillow for her nightgown, Lily asked curiously, "Do you remember your real parents?"

"No. I was only a year old when they realized that I was an Elemental, and they didn't want me after that."

"Do you know what their name was?"

Solstice shook her head. "No. It wasn't Flidae - that's the name they gave me in the first foster home. I don't care who my real parents were! They abandoned me because they were purebloods, and I would have disgraced them if they'd kept me!"

"That's so stupid! I'm glad I'm muggle-born, if that's what purebloods are like."

At Lily's vehement words, Solstice looked thoughtful. "Some purebloods don't care about all that. Potter and Black are both purebloods, and they think it's all rubbish."

Lily frowned, surprised to hear of the boys' attitude. "Is that what their families think?"

"They were talking about it on Saturday - Potter's family think the same way he does, but Black's family - well, they sound just awful. They think only purebloods should be allowed to learn magic, and no-one else should even be allowed to use it. They hate muggles. And any purebloods who disagree with them - they call them blood traitors. Black was really angry about it, he said he'd be friends with whoever he wanted. He's the first person in his family that wasn't sorted into Slytherin. His brother started school this year, and he's in Slytherin."

Solstice pulled her nightgown over her head, before adding, "I'm glad my parents didn't want me, if that's what they'd have tried to teach me!"

The two girls climbed into their beds, as the three other occupants of the dormitory entered. Aralia seemed put-out to find Lily deep in conversation with Solstice. The atmosphere in the dormitory was rather cool, but when Aralia's back was turned, Lily winked at Solstice who grinned in reply. When the room was finally in darkness, Lily suddenly said, "Solstice? Can I come and see your owl tomorrow?"

"All right. As soon as school is over for the day, we can go down to Hagrid's cabin, and see if Hoot will fly some more."

There was a snort of disgust from the direction of Aralia's bed, and Lily grinned. She wasn't planning to shut Aralia out completely – but she was very glad that everything seemed to have worked out with Solstice.

She turned over, snuggling under her quilt, and was asleep within minutes.


	8. A Person of Influence

As the students filed out of the Potions dungeon, Snape caught up with Lily. "I need your help," he said abruptly.

Lily looked up at him – he was quite a bit taller than her now. "Sev, is something wrong?"

He shook his head. "No, it's – it's just that I've never – I mean, not something like this…"

Lily grinned. "Sit with me at lunch and explain _properly_!" Snape nodded, and ten minutes later they found places at one of the tables in the Great Hall. "So, what do you need my help with?" Lily asked, but before Snape could reply, a sharp blow caught him between the shoulder blades. He swung around to find James Potter sneering at him.

"Sorry Snivellus, didn't see you there. I thought it was someone's dirty washing!" Potter began to walk away, amid the laughter of his inevitable entourage, but Lily called after him, "I'm not surprised Gryffindor lost the last Quidditch match, Potter, with a Seeker as clumsy as you!"

Potter turned back to her, his face flushed with anger. The recent loss was a sore point, especially as the opposing Seeker had beat him to the Snitch by mere inches, but before he could retort, one of the Gryffindor prefects said, "Move along, you Third Years. Other people are trying to get past!"

James scowled but held his tongue; Lily and Snape were left in peace, and Lily repeated her question. Snape looked mildly uncomfortable. "I need to buy dress robes, but – well, I don't know what I should get. I've never bought my own robes before."

Lily smiled – despite his earlier denial, she had half-suspected he was in some kind of trouble. This was something she could cope with. "We've got another Hogsmeade visit coming up next weekend, we could go to Gladrags and I'll help you find something."

"Thanks." Snape smiled at her, and it suddenly struck Lily how rarely she saw him smile these days. He took his school work very seriously, and outside class, even though he had a few friends in his house, he seemed to spend a lot of time off on his own.

"So what's the occasion? Why do you suddenly need dress robes?"

"It's for Christmas – I've got an invitation…" He felt in his pocket and pulled out a crumpled sheet of thick, cream-coloured parchment. Lily glanced at the crest that headed the letter, and her eyes widened.

"Do you mean – you've been invited to Malfoy Manor for Christmas?"

Snape nodded. "Yes – Malfoy writes to me occasionally – he says there's someone he wants me to meet."

"Who?"

"I don't know. Here - he says – it's someone who could, umm…" He began to read from the letter. "…'a person of considerable influence, who has expressed an interest in offering his patronage to promising individuals during their time at school and, potentially, when they are endeavouring to establish a career upon leaving school'."

Lily chuckled. "Sounds like Malfoy doesn't like using one word where ten will do." Snape frowned slightly, and she added hurriedly, "So this person might be able to help you get a job when you leave school? That's good. But – I mean, Malfoy Manor! The Malfoys are supposed to be the richest wizard family in England. Won't it be a bit – well, I think I'd feel a bit nervous if it was me… not that a muggle-born would ever get an invitation from _them_," she finished, grinning.

"Well…" he met her gaze. "I suppose it could be a bit intimidating at first. But Malfoy says that his family always has a lot of guests at Christmas, so I won't be the only one. And I'd like to see Malfoy Manor."

Lily laughed again. "You'll be able to tell me if it's true that they actually have albino peacocks. Aralia says that's what she's heard, but I think she's just having me on!"

* * *

Accordingly, on the day of the Hogsmeade visit, Lily and Snape headed towards Gladrags at the end of the main street. Solstice was with them – she had no interest in the shops, but as she explained, she wanted to replace the twig specimens she had destroyed after the last visit, and was heading for the woods beyond the railway line.

"But there won't be any leaves on them," Lily protested, when Solstice explained her quest.

"It doesn't matter – Professor Greenwood can identify them from the buds and the shape of the leaf scars and things like that. And he can tell me if they have any special uses in medicines or potions. Knowing that could be useful after I leave school."

Lily glanced at her friend with interest – this was the first time Solstice had mentioned having had any thoughts about a future career. "What do you think you'll do when you leave school, then?" she asked.

"Well, lots of Elementals become herbalists – we like to travel, you see, and it's useful to know all this stuff so we can make potions and medicines, in exchange for money or food. That's what Professor Greenwood was doing before he started teaching. What was it he called it… oh, I know, he said he was an 'itinerant healer and gardener'."

"Is that what you want to do?"

"I think so – I really like the idea of just traveling to lots of different places, so I'd need a way to support myself."

By now, they were outside Gladrags, so Solstice continued along the road, and as she watched the younger girl cross over the railway line, Lily reflected that her two closest friends seemed to be planning very different futures – Snape already making contacts among rich and influential wizards, and Solstice dreaming about a life drifting from place to place… as for herself, she had no idea what she really wanted to do when she left school.

When Lily and Snape left Gladrags, having found some dress robes that would be acceptable in the kind of company he would be keeping over Christmas, without exhausting his savings, Solstice rejoined them. Her pockets and hands were full of twigs. As they started back towards Hogwarts, Solstice asked, "Why do you need dress robes anyway, Sev?"

Snape explained, and Solstice looked genuinely puzzled. "But – Malfoy wasn't exactly nice to you when he was at school – why do you stay in touch with him?"

"He helped me sometimes – he told me how to stop Avery and Mulciber picking on me, and he taught me…" He stopped abruptly, realizing how close he'd come to letting out the secret. He wasn't sure if Malfoy would still be in trouble with the Ministry of Magic after all this time, for teaching him an Unforgivable curse, but he knew that Malfoy would not be pleased if he found out that Snape had told anyone about the incident.

"Taught you what?" Lily prompted.

"A spell. They stopped going for me after that."

The two girls exchanged glances. There was obviously more to the story than Snape was telling them, but knowing how stubborn he could be, it wasn't likely that he would explain.

"I don't like Mulciber," Solstice remarked. "He's spiteful – he bullies the First and Second Years."

"I'm not asking you to be his friend, so why do you care? Anyway, you can't talk – I've seen you going around with Potter and his crowd."

Solstice shrugged. "I just go to watch Quidditch. Black and Potter are pretty annoying, but Lupin's okay."

They walked in silence for a while, then Snape said, "There's something odd about Lupin…"

"How do you mean, odd?"

"Well – haven't you noticed how often he's in the hospital wing? And when he comes back, he usually looks like he's been in a fight."

Solstice nodded in unwilling agreement. "I know – but I don't think it's from fighting. He's not really like that."

"So what's wrong with him?"

"I don't know. I suppose he can't help it if he's ill a lot."

As they continued towards Hogwarts, Solstice frowned to herself. She'd noticed that Lupin was often absent, every few weeks, it seemed. And if anyone commented on it, the three other boys closed ranks to shut them up, so they must know something about the problem. If that had been all, she would have dismissed it as being some ailment they were embarrassed to discuss; but the injuries that were usually visible after one of Lupin's absences were harder to explain. She couldn't believe he was fighting – had it been Potter of Black, it might have been more understandable, but from what she had seen, Lupin actually had quite a gentle nature…

"Solstice!" She looked up, startled, to find Lily laughing at her, and even Snape grinned. "I've been yelling your name for five minutes!" Lily exclaimed.

"Oh – sorry, I was thinking about something."

"Does it usually take that much effort?"

Solstice laughed. "What is it, anyway?"

"I said, can we come and see your owl this afternoon?"

"Oh yes, of course! He flies really well now, and I'm going to move him to the Owlery soon, he's almost old enough…"

They went into the Great Hall together, to have lunch, and Lupin's mysterious illness was forgotten.

* * *

On the last day of term, the students woke to find snow falling steadily, and lying a good six inches deep already. Naturally, the weather only added to the festive spirit. Most of the students were leaving for the holidays; only a handful remained in Gryffindor house, including Solstice, and as she preferred to stay at school during the holidays, her spirits were as high as anyone's, with the prospect of a couple of weeks of freedom from study. After waving goodbye as her friends headed for the station, she pulled on her gloves and cloak, and set out to visit Hoot. She was planning to move him to the Owlery during this holiday, but for now he was still living in Hagrid's cottage.

As she approached the cottage, she could hear the occasional shout, and quickened her pace, curious to find out the cause. The door of the cottage was open, Hagrid and Professor Greenwood were backing out of the door, both hanging on to one end of a heavy rope. As Solstice watched, a shaggy, tawny head emerged; the rope was around the beast's neck, and it was resisting at every step. Gradually, the two men managed to drag the animal further through the doorway, and Solstice could see more of it. The creature was the size of a large dog, but its head resembled an overgrown cat, and its body was somewhat goat-like. By the time she could see the spiky, scaly tail, lashing angrily, she had realized that it must be a Chimera. A very small one, certainly, probably just a baby, but it was putting up a good fight.

For a few moments, Solstice was too fascinated by the beast to do more than stand, staring it. Then it looked up and saw her, and letting out a snarling roar, it bounded forward. The sudden slackening of the rope sent Hagrid and Professor Greenwood sprawling backwards into the thick snow, but Solstice didn't notice. With the Chimera galloping straight for her, she took off running toward the edge of the forest. Luckily, the nearest tree had several low branches; she swung herself easily onto the lowest, and began to scramble higher. The tree shook slightly as the Chimera thudded against the trunk. Without looking down, Solstice continued to climb, hoping desperately that Chimeras couldn't climb trees…

On the ground, the Chimera circled the tree, snarling horribly, and churning up drifts of snow as it lashed its tail in fury. It whipped around, growling, as the two men approached, and Professor Greenwood pulled out his wand, but before he could shout any spell, the Chimera snarled again, turned, and began to gallop into the forest. Gradually, the sound of its rush through the dense undergrowth died away, and silence descended. Solstice peered down anxiously. She'd climbed further than she'd realized, and found herself about twenty feet off the ground.

"Solstice! Are you all right?" Greenwood was standing under the tree, looking up. Slightly out of breath, Solstice gulped, then answered,

"Yes. Is it … gone?"

"It ran into the Forbidden Forest. I don't think it's going to bother us again for the moment." He was out of breath himself. "It's safe to come down now – can you climb down on your own?"

"Of course I can!"

Greenwood grinned at her affronted tone, and stepped back from the trunk as she began to descend. When she reached the lowest branch she jumped, and her feet slid from under her, so that she fell face-first into the churned snow. Greenwood pulled her to her feet, and she brushed half-heartedly at the snow caking her cloak and robes, then said, "That was a Chimera, wasn't it? I thought they lived in Greece."

"_Most_ of them do," Greenwood replied dryly. Professor and student turned to look at Hagrid, who was standing rather awkwardly in the doorway of the cottage.

"I was jus' lookin' after him for a friend, jus' temporarily," he explained.

"And where did your friend find it?"

"Brought it back from Greece in the summer. Course, it was jus' an egg then. After it hatched he figured he couldn't take care of it himself, so I said I'd find a spot for it here. It was no trouble at firs', but the past few weeks it's been a right handful!"

Greenwood sighed. "And I suppose it broke out of its pen…"

"Course not! I built that pen to last!" Hagrid told him indignantly.

"So – what was it doing in your cottage?" Greenwood's tone was faintly resigned. He had a feeling he could guess…

"Well, what with all this snow, I took him inside to warm up. He was a bit sleepy a first, but once he was warm, he got a bit above himself. Lucky you heard me yelling – if we hadn't got that rope on him, things could've got nasty!"

"But as it is, all that happened is that he nearly ran down a student, and now there's a Chimera loose on school grounds"

"Jus' in the forest! And he's jus' a baby…" Hagrid protested. Greenwood glared at him for a moment, then grinned and shook his head.

"Well, he's your problem – have fun catching him!" He turned to Solstice. "Looks like you need to change. Come on back to the castle…"

"But I came to fetch Hoot!" she protested. "He's been living in Hagrid's cottage…" She turned to look anxiously at Hagrid, but he hastened to reassure her.

"Now don' you worry, Solstice. Hoot was safely up in the rafters when I took Spot inside…"

"Spot?" Greenwood shook his head again. "Hagrid, only you could call a Chimera 'Spot'! Well, let's get that owl." They went into the cabin, where Hagrid tried unsuccessfully to coax the outraged owl down from its perch. Even Greenwood, using Elemental magic, couldn't summon him; then Solstice made an odd sound in her throat, a bubbling trill, and the owl spread its wings and glided noiselessly to her shoulder.

The snow was still falling heavily, as Solstice and Professor Greenwood started back towards the castle, leaving Hagrid to clear up the chaos that the Chimera had caused in his cottage.

* * *

As the train pulled out of the tiny country station, the sole passenger to alight stood uncertainly for a moment, looking around. Snape put his suitcase down at his feet. His letter had said that he would be met at the station, but as far as he could see, it was deserted. He walked through the brick archway into the lane beyond, and as he paused once more, he heard the crunch of wheels on the stony ground.

An elegant carriage, pulled by a pair of pale palomino horses, drew up and stopped in front of him. There was no driver, but the Malfoy crest was emblazoned on the door of the carriage, so Snape pulled it open, heaved his suitcase inside, and climbed in. As soon as he was seated, the carriage moved off smoothly. Evidently the horses were perfectly capable of drawing it without guidance.

For the first few miles, the countryside on either side of the quiet lane was unremarkable, but then the horses veered off onto a narrower road, which soon led into dense woods. Looming oak trees, massive, leafless, and menacing in the gathering dusk, were interspersed with thorn bushes. Occasionally, stealthy movements caught Snape's attention in the undergrowth closest to the road, and once the piercing scream of an owl shattered the oppressive gloom.

At length, the woods seemed to be less dense, and not quite so wild. The final transition was imperceptible, and Snape suddenly realized that the carriage was now passing between high, clipped hedges of holly, the dark, spiky leaves dotted with innumerable blood-red berries. The road passed through an intricate, wrought-iron gate, the holly hedges were left behind, and the carriage emerged into a wide driveway. There was a sudden rush of wings and hoarse, angry cries, as a murder of crows rose up into the sky, disturbed by the carriage; as he watched their flight, Snape's eyes were drawn to the building standing silhouetted against the last of the deep orange sunset.

Malfoy Manor presented a broad front, with many tall pointed roofs and towering, smoking chimneys. Lighted windows in the lowest floor of the main building gleamed like a row of bared teeth. A flight of broad, shallow steps ran up to the double front doors, and the carriage drew up before them. Snape climbed out, watching as the horses moved off again, drawing the carriage to the far end of the forecourt, and round a corner out of sight. He looked at the house, getting a better idea of the height, as it rose more than four storeys above him, the towers even higher. As he started up the steps, a long, mournful call echoed through the trees that dotted the expansive lawn which ran away from the courtyard. Glancing back, he glimpsed pale shapes moving through the shadows, but before he could make out what they were, the massive doors swung inward a little, spilling light down the steps to where he stood.

Snape stepped through the doors, finding himself in a grand foyer. It was brilliantly lit, the glow from many lamps reflecting off the highly polished furniture and the railings that edged the expansive staircase at the far end of the foyer. Whoever had opened the doors for him had vanished, and he stood a little awkwardly, wondering where he was supposed to go now. There were several doors leading off the foyer. Before he could decide what to do, the tall gilded door closest to him opened, and a familiar figure emerged.

Lucius Malfoy had always had a knack of appearing well-dressed, even in the Hogwarts school uniform; in garments of his own choosing, his platinum hair spilling over his shoulders and halfway down his back, he possessed an effortless elegance that made Snape feel untidy and awkward. During his first year at school, Snape had never been sure from one day to the next whether Malfoy would treat him with approval or censure. Tonight, he was clearly in the role of the patronizing older brother figure. He clapped Snape on the shoulder, directing him to leave his suitcase for a servant to deal with, and inquiring how his journey had been.

"So the train was delayed? Well, no matter, we don't dine until eight, so you haven't kept us waiting. Come into the drawing room, you must be introduced to my parents. It's just family this evening, no need for formality…"

Later, after the company had retired for the night, Snape relaxed slightly as he unpacked his suitcase in his exquisitely furnished guest room. He'd felt a little overawed at first, in the grand surroundings, but once the introductions were over, he was able to sit quietly, listening to the conversation, and observing those gathered.

'Just family' apparently included a fairly large number of relatives, ranging in age from an elderly witch with an autocratic manner, to a number of young adults, Lucius's contemporaries. Among the latter, he recognized Narcissa Black, who had been in Slytherin house until the previous summer. She barely glanced at Snape as he was introduced. During the evening, he noticed that she seemed to regard Malfoy with a faintly proprietary air; and he sensed that perhaps Malfoy found this a little irritating.

Over dinner, the situation became clearer. Mrs Malfoy steered the conversation towards the subject of the formal betrothal that was to take place in a few days, between two of Malfoy's cousins, then turned to her son, her icy-blue eyes challenging.

"No doubt we will be making the same plans for you and Narcissa before long…" but Malfoy's father interrupted brusquely,

"There'll be plenty of time for that once Lucius has a thorough grasp of the family business. I want him to accompany me to the continent over the next few months. I have some business dealings in mind that will be excellent experience for him. Besides… every young man need to sow a few wild oats before he settles down!"

Narcissa blushed, and Abraxas chuckled at her discomfiture. Mrs Malfoy regarded her husband with chilly disapproval at such vulgarity, and immediately changed the subject, but Snape saw Lucius glance at Narcissa with malicious enjoyment glittering in his eyes.

As he clambered into bed, Snape wondered whether Lucius had been given any choice in the matter. It was clear that Abraxas and his wife regarded the match as a foregone conclusion, differing only in their expectation of the timing of the formal betrothal and eventual marriage. Snape knew that in the circles the Malfoys frequented, arranged marriages were the norm, often contracted when the two individuals concerned were small children. He wondered how he'd feel if he were in that situation himself. He lay down, suddenly feeling exhausted. Perhaps it wouldn't be so bad if one liked the girl… his eyes drifted shut, and in moments he was asleep.

* * *

The next few days were so full that Snape had no time to be intimidated by the lavish surroundings.

His worst moment had been on Christmas Day, when the guests started arriving for the evening, and he spotted Regulus Black among them. For a full, horrified minute he thought he would find himself thrown into the company of one of his sworn enemies; but he overheard Regulus explaining that Sirius was 'staying with a friend for Christmas'. This information was received with a curt nod from Mrs Malfoy, but as the boy moved away to join the other youngsters, Snape heard her mutter,

"Why they allow that friendship to continue, I simply can't imagine… I've never trusted the Potters; blood traitors, no better than the mudblood scum they associate with!" Abraxas nodded, clearly in full agreement with his wife's sentiments, as he turned to welcome the next group of guests.

Snape frowned slightly; while he was delighted to hear that James Potter's family was regarded so poorly by the Malfoys, the venom in Mrs Malfoy's tone was troubling. Lily Evans was muggle-born, and Snape felt a sudden flare of anger at Mrs Malfoy for referring to those like her as scum.

Later in the evening, Lucius appeared at his side. "Do you ride?" he asked abruptly.

Snape stared at him. "Ride? A - a horse, do you mean?"

"Yes, a horse." He regarded Snape for a moment, his pale eyes betraying momentary irritation, then he shrugged. "No, I don't suppose you do. Most of us will be hunting tomorrow morning. No doubt you can amuse yourself. Feel free to use the library."

Snape nodded. "Will you be fox-hunting?"

Lucius grinned. "Ah, foxes. The favoured prey of muggles with delusions of grandeur. No, Severus, I suspect that our intended quarry will provide us with far more amusement than any _four_-legged beast..." He turned away, laughing, and Snape wondered uncomfortably exactly what kind of two-legged creature would find itself on the wrong side of tomorrow's hunt.

* * *

Snape joined several other non-riding guests watching as the hunt gathered early the next morning. It was an impressive turnout. Lucius was riding a powerful-looking grey, which moved impatiently against the bit, stepping sideways, throwing its head up, and occasionally trying to half-rear. Lucius seemed unconcerned by the animal's restlessness, checking its antics automatically as he chatted to other riders. He presented a striking figure, clad in a dark green jacket, spotless white breeches and gleaming leather boots, and had collected a knot of young women around him, including one wearing an elaborate habit, and riding side-saddle. Her formal turnout contrasted with her flirtatious manner, and she met Lucius's speculative gaze boldly.

Eventually, the riders began to move off, and as the sound of trotting hooves faded into the distance, Snape went back inside, finding his way to the library, where he became absorbed in the wide selection of books, including an extensive section dealing with the Dark Arts.

Several hours later, he heard the first sounds of the hunt returning. He put aside the book he was reading, and went to the window, which overlooked the courtyard, and saw Lucius dismounting. He'd clearly taken a fall; he was plastered with mud on his left side, and his horse's front legs were caked to the knees. A groom approached, and Snape just caught Lucius's words through the glass.

"I thought this horse was trained! The brute stumbled, had us both in a ditch..." He was furious, his normally pale face flushed. He strode to the horse's head, seized the reins, and raised a leather crop in his other hand, apparently intending to slash the animal's head, but before the blow fell, a voice roared, "Lucius!"

Abraxas rode into the yard, and the strong resemblance between father and son was reinforced by the identical expression of fury on his face. "That's a valuable animal! I won't have another horse ruined by your temper, boy!" For a moment, it seemed that Lucius might strike the horse anyway; but his father was still mounted, and his vantage point gave Abraxas both a physical and a psychological advantage. Lucius flung the reins back at the groom, and stormed towards the nearest door. Watching him go, Abraxas shouted,

"Get yourself cleaned up, boy! Your appearance is a disgrace!"

Snape, shrinking back from the window to avoid being caught eavesdropping, caught a glimpse of Lucius's face, contorted with rage, as he passed the window.

Nothing more was said about the incident, but at dinner that evening, despite maintaining an outwardly calm and relaxed appearance, Lucius was still furious. The fall itself he had forgotten; but he fumed at the memory of his father's words and tone. To be spoken to as if he were a grubby child was impossible for his arrogant nature to shrug off. The old man had been pushing him almost beyond endurance lately, and Abraxas would do well to brush up on family history, Lucius thought sardonically. His father seemed to have forgotten that more than one Malfoy ancestor had suffered a mysterious and untimely demise, leaving the way open for a son to take over as head of the family...

However, there was nothing to be gained from dwelling on it this evening. If his father realized how infuriated Lucius was, he was quite capable of dragging the incident up over dinner, in order to humiliate him. He drew a breath, forcing himself to relax, and raised his goblet to his lips. As he sipped the wine, he glanced up, and realized he was being watched. It was the flirtatious young woman from the hunt; her name was Serafine, he recalled, and she had been trying to catch his attention for the past few days.

This, he thought, might be just what he needed to distract him from the day's events. He glanced across the table at Narcissa, who was conversing politely with fellow diners, every inch the demure young lady. Lucius's eyes narrowed slightly. Although their betrothal had yet to be formalized, there was no doubt in his mind that he would eventually marry her. That was just the way things were done. Yet she allowed him few of the privileges he felt were his by right. She tolerated his advances to a point, but the moment his hands threatened to stray below her waist, she stopped him cold, insisting that he must wait until they were married. Forcing the issue would merely result in tiresome recriminations, and he had long resigned himself to seeking an outlet for his desire with more willing partners.

His gaze slid back to Serafine, and he stared at her intently for a few moments, long enough to communicate his interest to her. She blushed and glanced down at her plate, then looked up at him once more, her eyes meeting his with mingled challenge and promise. He smiled slightly, knowing he would have her later, and turned to answer a question from his mother.

* * *

The conservatory was dark and shadowy, with a heady scent of foliage and damp earth that contrasted with the bleak, wintry landscape outside the glass.

Lucius drew Serafine into the room, and slid his arms around her. She turned vivid blue eyes up to his face, a hint of triumph on her full lips. Lucius bent his head and kissed her hard, feeling his desire intensify as her mouth opened under his. Without breaking the kiss, he moved her further into the garden-room. Serafine drew her head back, smiling, and ran her tongue teasingly over her lips as she trailed her hands down over his chest, toying with the buttons of his shirt. Lucius pulled her down onto a wrought-iron bench that was set in an alcove between two tropical ferns. He pressed Serafine back against the the cushions, kissing down her neck as his hand slid from her waist to her knee, then back up, this time beneath the whispering silk of her dress.

She jumped and put her hand on his, now halfway up her thigh. "You really mustn't..." she murmured.

His fingers tightened on her leg. "You knew what I wanted when we came in here." There was the faintest edge to his voice.

She smiled coyly. "Of course I did. But propriety demands that I make a protest." She giggled. "Even if it's just a token one!" She released his errant hand, and leant towards him, giggling again as he continued his quest.

His movements grew more urgent. He tugged at her underwear, and fumbled with his own clothes before he pushed her back on the bench, his body half on top of hers. She shifted beneath him, allowing him easier access. He was moving hard against her now, her wrists gripped in his hands. He gasped. Closed his eyes. His body tensed and he made a noise midway between a groan and a snarl. He stopped moving, his hands still immobilizing hers. After a minute or two, he sat up, pulling away from her, and as he fastened his trousers, he glanced at her. Serafine straightened her clothes, and her eyes were faintly resentful as she watched him walk towards the door.

She got up and followed him, but when they got to the door he suddenly caught her waist in both hands, pulling her tight against him. "Which guest room are you staying in?" he asked softly, his lips close to her ear.

Serafine hesitated. A quick tumble in the garden-room was one thing, but allowing Lucius into her bedroom risked discovery and scandal - for her, anyway.

Lucius watched her face, knowing what she was thinking. By leaving the girl unsatisfied, he hoped to gain her agreement to a more prolonged encounter later that night. He moved his hands, one down past the small of her back, the other tracing a path upwards from her waist. He kissed her neck and brushed his lips along the line of her jaw, making the lightest of contacts with her mouth. He held her gaze, and whispered, "Which room? We could take our time..."

She was breathing faster, and he pressed his fingers harder against her. Finally, she murmured, "The Blue Room..."

He smiled, kissed her, then was gone without a word.

* * *

Serafine smiled to herself as she dressed the next morning. Lucius had left her just after dawn, with a final kiss that seemed to hold the promise of future favours expected and reciprocated. She took extra care with her hair and makeup, choosing a dress that complemented her colouring perfectly. It was too soon to know where this would lead, but a liaison with any Malfoy held the possibility of advancement in society.

She descended the stairs gracefully, and walked confidently into the breakfast room. Then she stopped dead, suddenly feeling as if she'd been slapped. Lucius was there already, sitting beside Narcissa. His hand covered one of hers, and his head was inclined towards her, his entire attention apparently focused on what she was saying.

Trying to cover her reaction, Serafine continued into the room, as Lucius stood up. "Are you finished, my dear," he asked Narcissa, his voice loud enough to ensure that Serafine heard him. Narcissa nodded, and as she stood up she smiled at him, pleasantly surprised by his attentiveness this morning. Her expression was faintly smug as they walked towards the door, and she barely glanced at Serafine as they passed her. Lucius, however, looked directly at her, and there was no mistaking the mockery in his smile.

Summoning what little was left of her dignity, Serafine went to the sideboard, and poured herself a cup of coffee, as she tried unsuccessfully to swallow the feeling of having been expertly manipulated.

* * *

Snape had been starting to wonder if the planned meeting that Malfoy had mentioned in his letter had been canceled. However, after dinner on the final night of his stay, Malfoy steered him towards the library. At the door, he paused. "You mention this meeting to no-one," he cautioned. "Even my father does not realize exactly who my - visitor - is."

Snape nodded, wondering why such secrecy was necessary. Malfoy stared at him intently.

"Answer his questions truthfully!" he said abruptly. "If you don't, he will know. And he will be... displeased." His face tightened momentarily, as if at some painful memory. He hesitated a moment longer, then tapped on the door. A low voice responded, "Enter."

When they walked into the room, Snape saw a figure seated in the chair beside the fire. Without turning, the man said, "This is the boy you told me about, Lucius?"

"Yes, my lord."

Snape glanced at Malfoy, startled by his deferential tone.

The man by the fire rose to his feet, turning to face Snape. He was tall, and despite being heavily cloaked, he seemed thin and angular in build. He stood partly in shadow, and Snape had a fleeting impression of greying hair swept back from a gaunt face that was so pale as to seem almost transparent. He noticed little more about the man's features, however, because the stranger's eyes locked onto his in an intense, almost hypnotic gaze.

"What is your name?" His voice was soft yet penetrating.

"Severus Snape."

"Snape... that's not a pureblood name, is it?"

"No, sir."

"You're a half-blood?"

"Yes, sir."

The man continued to hold Snape in his snake-like gaze. "Do you know who I am?" The dark, bloodshot eyes gave nothing away.

"No, sir."

"You may address me as Lord Voldemort. Do not be discouraged by your blood status. Despite what my pureblooded young friend may believe..." his gaze flicked towards Lucius with more than a hint of malice, "...a half-blood can rise to unimagined heights of power, if he desires it strongly enough. Come closer."

Snape took several steps towards Voldemort, so that he had to look up in order to continue meeting his gaze. The dark eyes remained locked on his, and he had a sudden sense that Lord Voldemort could see his thoughts, that all his innermost secrets were laid bare. Briefly, he tried to resist the intrusion, but after a minute or so, his defenses were brushed aside. "Interesting..." Voldemort's voice had a chill, bleak quality, like dry reeds scraping against each other in a winter wind. "Few people are capable of resisting my mind for even a few moments," he continued. "Have you been trained in occlumency?"

"No, Lord Voldemort." His answer seemed to please the man.

"So it comes naturally to you? With training and practice you may develop considerable skill in the art. A valuable asset. Why do you hate your father so much?"

The sudden change of subject caught Snape off guard, and he said harshly, "Because he beats my mother!" He sensed a sudden movement from Malfoy; his answer had been brusque to the point of disrespect, but Voldemort merely nodded slightly.

"He beats you too." It was a statement, not a question, and Snape replied, "Yes, Lord Voldemort."

Again he nodded, never allowing his compelling gaze to waver. "A man may come to regret such actions, when the son achieves his full potential!" He was silent for a moment. "It seems to me that you may achieve a great deal if you fulfill your own potential. You have qualities that would be useful to me one day. If you work to develop them, there may, perhaps, be a place for you in my plans."

At last he released Snape from the compulsion of his gaze, and glanced towards Malfoy. "Lucius..."

"Yes, my lord?"

"You did well to bring the boy to my notice. Stay for a moment, I have words for your ears alone."

Snape felt Malfoy's hand grip his shoulder, drawing him away, but he had already started to back towards the door, knowing that he had been dismissed. He slipped out, closing the door softly, as Voldemort said to Malfoy, "Now, as to the matter we discussed earlier..."

Snape let out a breath, feeling the sudden release of tension. Nothing specific had been said, no promises of patronage, yet he sensed that he had taken the first step on a path that would affect his future in ways he could scarcely begin to imagine.

* * *

To Snape's surprise, Malfoy joined him in the carriage that took him to the station very early the next morning. As the driverless horses set off between the high holly hedges lining the drive, Malfoy said, "Lord Voldemort was pleased with you. He thinks you have great potential. However..." He paused, his expression calculating, and Snape said,

"Yes?"

"You should consider carefully the company you keep at school. Who you choose as friends may reflect on you if you don't choose wisely. There are... certain types that you should regard with caution. Mudbloods, muggle-lovers... the sort of people who will not find favour with Lord Voldemort when he... in the days ahead." Snape nodded, uncomfortably aware that his friendship with Lily would come under this stricture. "Even among purebloods, there are undesirables. Blood traitors. Misbegotten freaks like Elementals. Of course, they have their uses, from time to time. But associate too closely with them, and the taint will rub off on you. Do you understand?"

"I understand."

Malfoy regarded him appraisingly. "But you don't agree. At your age, it's difficult to comprehend how important such things are. But you must keep it in mind if you want to be a part of Lord Voldemort's plans."

"What - what is he planning?"

Malfoy shook his head. "I can't speak of it to you. But - it will change our world forever. Those who are on his side will prosper. Those who aren't... well, just make sure you're not among them." He spoke little more during the rest of the carriage-ride, but as Snape climbed out, checking his pockets for his train ticket, Malfoy said, "Keep my advice in mind. You'll come to realize that I'm right." He swung the door of the carriage shut, and Snape stepped back as the horses started forward. He picked up his suitcase, and went through to the station platform.

As so often in the past, Malfoy's words had raised more questions in his mind than they answered.


	9. Catching Up

**THIRD YEAR - EARLY JUNE**

Solstice looked up from the essay she was writing. Professor Greenwood was absorbed in his own work, but it didn't look as if he was writing - the strokes of the quill weren't right. Cautiously, Solstice sat up straighter, craning to see what he was doing. He was sketching. It looked as if he was drawing a stone circle - like Stonehenge, but with a lot of the stones missing. It was, she realized, a drawing of how Muggles apparently saw Stonehenge, not as a complete circle of capped stones, but with gaps and missing stones, the remaining standing stones tilted at crazy angles. She'd heard that every year, thousands of Muggles gathered at the ancient monument, celebrating midsummer - completely unaware that among their number were a few wizards who could see the circle as it really was, rather than a haphazard ruin. For a moment, Solstice felt a flicker of sympathy for Muggles, unable to see one of England's most impressive monuments in its full glory; then she remembered what she'd wanted to ask.

"Professor...?"

"Hmm?" he replied distractedly, still absorbed in his sketching.

"Professor - what's the Great Rite?"

That got his attention. He put down his quill and looked up at her. "Where did you hear about it?" he asked cautiously.

Solstice reached into her school bag, and pulled out a large, battered book that she'd borrowed from the library. "I read about it in here. At least - it mentions it several times, but it never actually says what it is."

"I see." He paused for a moment, considering what level to put his explanation on. "The Great Rite is sex magic," he said simply. "In some cultures, it's done when the fields are planted, to ensure a good harvest. I wasn't planning to talk about it for a few years. It's very advanced magic, because it requires focus and concentration that most people aren't capable of, even as adults."

Solstice nodded, apparently satisfied with the explanation. She wrote a few more words on her essay, then looked up again. "Why are the other kids so silly about sex?"

"How do you mean?"

"Well... any time something to do with sex is mentioned, the girls blush and giggle, and the boys laugh and make jokes. Usually the jokes aren't even funny."

Professor Greenwood smiled. "I know what you mean about the jokes. Some adults are like that too."

"But why?"

"Well - for most people sex is a very private thing, and often they feel embarrassed talking about private things. So they laugh, or make jokes, or change the subject, to cover up how they feel." Solstice nodded, and he went on, "Elementals tend not to feel that way. It's just one of the personality traits that makes us different. We see sex as being just another thing that the body does - like breathing or eating. So we don't feel embarrassed talking about it. Most girls of your age would feel very uncomfortable discussing sex with their teacher - especially if their teacher is a man. Come to think of it, a lot of teachers would feel just as awkward!"

Solstice looked sceptical, and he grinned, and added, "You'll have to take my word for it. But as you get older, you'll learn more about how other people see things - especially that non-Elementals often see things very differently from Elementals. The important thing is to respect how other people feel. It's not fair to make them feel uncomfortable."

"Okay." Solstice looked thoughtful, suddenly frowning, and Professor Greenwood said, "What else? You can talk to me about it, because it doesn't make me uncomfortable."

"Well - one of the boys said something about Elementals and sex - he said we were... promiscuous, but I don't know what that means. Then everyone laughed - and they were laughing at me."

"Ah yes." Professor Greenwood sighed. "Promiscuous means that someone has sex with a lot of different people, and many people think that's wrong, especially if it's a girl. I'm afraid Elementals have a reputation for being promiscuous - not because it's true, but because non-Elementals simply don't understand that we just have a different attitude to sex."

"But - that's not fair, if we have to respect the way they see things, but they don't respect us in return."

"No, it's not fair - and that's just life. A lot of things aren't fair."

"Well, I don't even want to have sex - not till I'm a lot older, anyway!"

"And that's fine. If you don't want to - even when you _are_ older - you don't have to. Not for any reason. But there is one more thing you need to know..."

"Yes?"

"You will have to be more careful than other girls, because you won't be able to use a charm to stop yourself getting pregnant. The other girls have the option to use a charm instead of a potion, but you don't have that choice. Well - you could also ask the boy to perform the it for you, but you have to be certain that he can do it, properly so you'll need to learn it anyway, so you can tell him. All the girls at Hogwarts learn how to make a contraceptive potion - in Fourth Year, I think. And the charm is taught to all students later."

Solstice sighed. "It all sounds very complicated."

"Yes. It's complicated for everyone - just a bit more so for Elementals, because we have a different way of looking at things, that other people don't always understand." He glanced over at her parchment. "How are you doing with that essay on the use of animals in weather magic?"

Solstice looked down at the parchment. "It's a bit confusing - some of the rituals seem quite simple, but people hardly ever use them."

"Such as?"

"Well - " she pulled another book from her bag, and opened it at a marker. "It says here that a way to encourage rain is to bathe a cat... but that it's not a popular ritual. I mean, there are always lots of cats around, so you'd think..."

"Solstice... have you ever tried to bathe a cat?"

"Well no, but..." she suddenly giggled, as she pictured the process. "Oh, I see!"

"Exactly! Sometimes perfectly good magic just isn't... practical." The bell rang, and Solstice started to gather her books and papers. "Potions next?" Professor Greenwood asked.

"Yes. I really like Potions, Professor Slughorn says I have a natural talent for it."

Professor Greenwood nodded. "Most Elementals do - that's one reason why we're good herbalists. Anyway, you'd better get going, or you'll be late."

* * *

By the time Solstice arrived in the Potions dungeon, Professor Slughorn was already there, handing out ingredients. "Ah, Miss Flidae, I'm delighted you decided to join us at last."

"I'm sorry, Professor, but it's a long way from..."

"Yes, well - next time you're late I'll deduct house points. Take a seat, please - I believe Mr Lupin is the only one without a partner..."

Solstice made her way to the back of the room, and dumped her school bag beside the workbench where Remus was already setting up a cauldron. He smiled at Solstice, and she said, "What are we making today?"

"We're revising Shrinking Solution. I've already started cutting up the daisy roots - why don't you skin the shrivelfig?"

"Okay." She set to work, carefully running the tip of her knife down the skin of the shrivelfig.

Most of the time, the students picked their own work partners, but occasionally, as was the case today, Professor Slughorn assigned them at random. James Potter was at the desk in front of Remus, with another Gryffindor girl as his partner, while the other Marauders were on the other side of the room. Lily was at the bench next to Solstice, and by her expression, it was clear that she had something she wanted to tell her. After five minutes or so, she leaned over and said, "Guess what?"

"What?"

"Vincent Algethi asked me out!" She spoke quietly, but at least two other students besides the two girls were suddenly paying attention. James's head snapped around; and on Lily's other side, Snape looked up from his daisy roots, his expression darkening.

Oblivious to the boys' interest, Lily and Solstice leaned closer together. "But he's a fifth year," Solstice whispered.

Lily nodded. "Yes. And he's gorgeous!"

Snape flung a handful of chopped daisy roots into the cauldron, and began slicing up caterpillars with considerably more force than necessary.

"So you said yes?" Solstice asked, her voice rising slightly.

"Of course I did."

"So where are you going to go? Is he taking you out for the Hogsmeade visit on Saturday?"

"Yes. But he asked me to go for a walk by the lake this evening, too." She looked at Solstice a little anxiously. "I know I was going to watch you training Hoot today, but - would you mind terribly if we put it off? If you do, I'll tell him I'll go for a walk tomorrow, but..."

"No, it's all right. I don't mind. Maybe I'll take Hoot to watch the Quidditch practice instead."

"Thanks!"

The girls turned their attention back to their work for the moment. Lily glanced at her friend, remembering how jealous Solstice had been, back in the autumn, when Lily seemed to be spending time with other friends. She really didn't seem to mind now. Lily grinned, and leaned over again. "I bet you'll get asked out by someone soon," she said, only half-teasing.

"Me?" Solstice giggled, and her hand shook as she poured leech juice into the cauldron she was sharing with Remus. She peered into it anxiously, wondering if she'd added too much, but then shrugged and turned back to Lily. "Who'd ask me out? I'm still just a kid..."

Lily looked at her appraisingly. "Hmm... you know, I think you've actually grown a bit."

"Really?"

"Yes. I'm sure you're taller."

Solstice grinned. "If I am, it's not much. Remember what happened in the library?" The girls both grinned. Reaching for a book on a high shelf, Solstice had tried to use the second-lowest shelf as a step, slipped, and brought a pile of books crashing down on her head, resulting in a painful bruise on her forehead, the loss of ten house points, and a stern lecture about the proper use of the library.

"Solstice - is the rat spleen ready?" Remus asked.

"Yes, I've just finished cleaning it." She dropped the lump of red flesh into the cauldron, and they both watched as the contents bubbled briefly, then turned brilliant green." They grinned at each other. "I thought I'd put in too much leech juice," Solstice explained, "but it looks as though it was just right." They began to clean up their bench, while Lily looked worriedly at the potion she and Snape had created. Instead of bubbling, it continued to steam slightly, remaining a murky brown colour.

"I don't know what went wrong," she said.

Snape scowled. "I think I put in too many sliced caterpillars," he muttered.

"Oh - well there's not much we can do about that. Maybe we'll get a mark for at least knowing what we did wrong."

At the bench where James was working, the cauldron suddenly gave out a prolonged hiss, and clouds of vile-smelling pink smoke billowed into the room. Above the exclamations of disgust that rose on all sides, James's partner could be heard saying, "I told you that was ferret liver, not rat spleen, you were using! Why didn't you listen..?"

Filing out of the dungeon at the end of the lesson, Sirius said, "What happened? You made that potion perfectly the first time we made it."

James shrugged. "Must've been distracted," he said shortly, and changed the subject.

* * *

Solstice climbed the stairs to her dormitory that evening, expecting to find it empty, but instead found Lily lying on her bed, apparently engrossed in a book. For a few minutes, neither girl spoke. Solstice had set a fresh candle in an iron candlestick, and was searching for her matches. It looked as if she'd lost them, which was a nuisance. Not many people at Hogwarts had them, having no need for matches when they could produce a flame with a wand, but Professor Greenwood had provided Solstice with a supply so that she didn't always have to rely on others. Finally, she turned to her friend. "Lily - light this for me, please. I can't find my matches."

Lily silently pulled her wand from her pocket, and pointed it. The candle wick flared, and Solstice said, "Thanks." She set the candle on the window ledge, before asking, "So how was your walk with Vincent?"

Lily slammed her book shut with a bang. "He's an absolute git!" she said angrily.

Solstice frowned. "What happened?"

"He couldn't keep his hands to himself. I told him three times that I didn't mind if he put his arm round me, but to stop letting his hand go so low."

"And - he wouldn't stop?"

"Oh, eventually he stopped that. But the next thing I knew, he reached around and put his hand on my... well, anyway - if he doesn't have a black eye tomorrow, I'll know I didn't slap him hard enough!"

"Oh."

"And then - " Lily's eyes sparkled angrily at the memory, "he had the cheek to ask me if I was still going to Hogsmeade with him on Saturday! I always thought he seemed nice, but it turns out he's as - as arrogant as - I don't know..."

"Potter?" Solstice suggested.

"As bad as Potter and Black put together!"

Solstice grimaced. "What a horrible thought!"

Lily sighed, then grinned, feeling better now she'd let off steam about the incident. "Well, anyway - I suppose you want some peace so you can meditate. I'll see you later." As the sound of her footsteps faded away down the stairs, Solstice sat down in the window alcove, drawing her legs under her, and moving the candle so she could rest her gaze on it comfortably. It was warm in the dormitory - it was June, after all - and she reached over and opened the window a little. In the sudden current of fresh air, her candle flickered and went out.

Solstice looked at it in exasperation. Now she'd have to go down to the common room and get someone to relight it for her. She reached to pick it up, but as her fingers touched the wax, the wick suddenly reignited. Solstice examined the candle suspiciously. Maybe it hadn't gone out all the way... but she was _sure_ it had. She frowned as a thought struck her. She licked her finger and thumb, and pinched out the flame, making sure that it was completely out. Then she focused her gaze on the wick, and slowly reached to touch the candle again. There was a tiny crackle, and the flame flickered to life.

She tried again several times, and quickly found that she didn't even have to touch the candle. She could relight it just by concentrating. She sat for a few minutes, enjoying the feeling of triumph. Then she snatched up the candle and hurtled down the staircase. "Lily, I can do it! Look!"

Lily looked up from the sofa where she was reading a magazine article that Aralia had pointed out to her. Solstice set the candle on the table beside the sofa, stepped back a little, and lit it. "Solstice! You've never done that before! Lily exclaimed.

Solstice grinned. "No - I didn't realise I could do it yet." She whirled around and ran to the portrait hole.

"Where are you going?" Lily sounded confused, and Solstice turned back just long enough to say,

"I have to show Professor Greenwood!"

Professor Greenwood was writing a letter when Solstice hammered on his study door. Wondering what was wrong, he opened the door, but one look at Solstice's face told him that whatever had happened, she was pleased. "I can finally do it!" she announced. "Watch!" She took a candlestick from over the fireplace, set it on the Professor's desk, and demonstrated her new talent.

"Can you do it consistently?" he asked.

"Every time."

"Try something bigger..." He glanced around. There was no fire burning in the fireplace, but there was wood piled there, and Professor Greenwood said, "Light the fire - but do it gently! Try not to burn the school down..." Solstice grinned - her tendency to work unfamiliar magic on too large a scale was a running joke between them. She concentrated for a moment, then the logs ignited, flames leaping up the chimney. Professor Greenwood extinguished the fire, and said, "Try again with a touch more control." Solstice nodded, and this time the flames were much smaller. Once again Professor Greenwood put out the flames, then smiled at Solstice. "Congratulations. It looks as if your adult magic is starting to manifest. It's too late in the term to do much with it, but in September you can start to study fire magic properly."

"And moon magic too?"

"Certainly. Although you may not be able to work it for a couple more months. The ability usually comes a little later than fire magic."

"Can I try it on my own?"

"There's no harm in attempting it." A sudden thought struck him. "Solstice! There's just one thing..."

"Yes?"

"I know it's tempting, but don't try anything at full moon."

"Why not?"

Professor Greenwood hesitated. He couldn't explain the real reason; normally he would never consider withholding the truth from his student, but in this case... "There are things about the moon that you won't understand for a while yet. It could be dangerous for you to go out at full moon. It's not something to fool around with. Promise me you'll stay inside after dark at full moon."

Solstice sensed that there was something more behind his warning, but all she said was, "All right - I promise."

"Good." He grinned. "And so long as you're careful, you can practice fire magic. But don't try setting fire to anything you shouldn't!"

"Okay. I'll be careful."

"I'm glad to hear it. The last thing we need it - oh, I don't know - the Gryffindor Seeker's underwear spontaneously combusting during an important match..." Solstice looked at him sharply, and he gave her a conspiratorial grin. "Off you go. I've got a letter to write."

Running back up the stairs to the Gryffindor common room, Solstice wondered how Professor Greenwood knew she'd been involved in that legendary incident at the Quidditch match back in Second Year. He'd never said anything about it before, but it was surely too much of a coincidence for him to use that example if he didn't know - especially with the way he'd grinned. She laughed to herself, and paused at a window, looking out at the darkening grounds, and the moon starting to rise in the east. It was just about full; it was a pity Professor Greenwood had made her promise not to go out at full moon, but maybe in a couple of years, it would be okay.

She continued on her way, remembering as she climbed through the portrait hole that she wanted to check her notes on the Shrinking Potion with Remus. She glanced around, but he wasn't with the other Marauders. "Where's Lupin? I need to check something about that potion?"

"He's not feeling well," James told her casually.

"Oh. Is he in the hospital wing?"

Sirius nodded. "Yeah. But his books are on the table..." Sirius reached over and rummaged in the pile, extracting a battered notebook. "Here's his Potions notebook."

"Thanks." Solstice took the notebook, and began to flip through it; with her attention diverted, she didn't notice the glance that passed between the three remaining Marauders.


End file.
